WHY  PROHIBITION! 
CHARLES   STELZLE 


WHY  PROHIBITION!- 


BY 

CHARLES  STELZLE 


NEW  ^S£T  YORK 
GEORGE  H.  DORAN  COMPANY 


Copyright,  1918, 
By  George  H.  Doran  C&mpcwy 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


TO 

WILLIAM  F.  COCHRAN 

Whose  friendship  and  generosity 
have  made  possible  the  author's 
work  of  research  and  prohibition 
propaganda  among  workingmen. 


PREFACE 

America  needs  patriots — not  only  those  who  will 
go  to  the  battle  line  in  France,  but  also  men  and 
women,  too,  who  will  strengthen  the  hands  of  the 
boys  who  have  gone  to  the  Front 

Our  greatest  peril  is  that  of  waste — and  the 
greatest  waster  in  our  country  is  the  liquor  traffic. 

To  strengthen  America  by  precept  and  practice  is 
a  distinct  obligation  resting  upon  every  citizen  of 
this  Republic. 

This  book  is  written  to  point  out  the  perils  con- 
nected with  the  liquor  business  in  this  and  every 
other  land.  The  facts  presented  are  the  results  of 
a  careful  study  covering  a  period  of  years. 

It  is  hoped  that  they  may  be  of  service  to  the 
valiant  fighters  who  need  ammunition  to  batter  down 
the  bulwarks  of  booze. 


Yii 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

PREFACE vii 

I  A  CONFESSION— BY  WAY  OF  INTRODUCTION  15 

II  A  CHALLENGE  TO  AMERICA     ....  22 

III  How  MUCH  Do  WE  SPEND  FOR  LIQUOR?  43 

IV  LOST  JOBS  WHEN  SALOONS  ARE  CLOSED  .  56 
V  PERSONAL  LIBERTY  AND  PROHIBITION    .  71 

VI   WORKINGMEN  AND  THE  SALOON     ...  90 

VII  ORGANISED  LABOUR  AND  THE  SALOON    .  118 

VIII  THE  SALOON  AND  SOCIALJ^EFORM     .     .  162 

IX  LIQUOR  AND  THE  LENGTH  OF  LIFE     .     .  190 

X  WHY  THE  SALOON  MUST  Go  .      .     .     .215 

XI  TAXATION  AND  COMPENSATION     .     .     .  238 

XII  SUBSTITUTES  FOR  THE  SALOON      .     .     .  252 

XIII  How  PROHIBITION  WORKS  IN  PRACTICE  276 

XIV  How  TO  FIGHT  THE  SALOON   ....  298 


WHY  PROHIBITION! 


WHY  PROHIBITION! 


A  Confession — By  Way  of  Introduction 

I  AM  a  prohibitionist — 

But,  frankly,  I  hate  the  name.  It  suggests  long- 
haired men  and  short-haired  women.  It  is  negative 
and  limited,  but  it  expresses  exactly  what  those  who 
are  opposed  to  liquor  are  trying  to  do. 

And  I  am  for  it.  I  want  to  see  the  liquor  busi- 
ness abolished.  And  if  this  is  to  be  done,  we'll  have 
to  take  off  our  kid  gloves  and  fight  the  thing  with 
bare  fists — as  prohibitionists. 

Whatever  may  have  been  the  limitations  of  pro- 
hibitionists in  the  past  and  no  matter  how  much  they 
were  ridiculed,  nevertheless  they  put  the  fear  of  God 
into  the  hearts  of  the  liquor  men,  caused  our  legis- 
lators to  lay  their  ears  to  the  ground,  induced  world- 
powers  to  place  a  ban  on  booze,  prompted  employ- 
ers of  labour  to  promote  anti-liquor  campaigns  and 
persuaded  thousands  upon  thousands  of  individuals 
to  get  on  the  water-wagon. 

The  victories  achieved  in  the  battle  against  the 

15 


16  ; ;  Why  Prohibition ! 

saloon  would  never  have  been  possible  had  it  not 
been  for  the  foundation  work  of  modest,  home- 
loving,  white-ribboned  women,  who  for  a  generation 
or  more  have  faithfully  gone  to  Woman's  Christian 
Temperance  Union  Meetings  to  pray  and  to  pay  for 
a  movement  which  next  to  the  Church  and  the  home, 
seemed  to  them  the  greatest  in  the  world. 

The  men,  too,  have  had  their  part  in  developing 
the  present-day  sentiment  against  the  saloon.  Early 
in  the  fight  when  it  required  real  grit  to  be  known 
as  a  prohibitionist — for  in  those  days  men  were 
laughed  at  for  taking  a  stand  against  the  saloon,  and 
it  requires  more  downright  upstanding  nerve  to  be 
laughed  at  than  to  be  shot  at — the  preachers  were 
the  leaders  of  the  movement.  These  were  the  pio- 
neers who  spent  themselves  talking  about  the  "demon 
rum"  and  the  "cursed  saloon"  until  more  recently 
the  laymen  got  on  the  job. 

And  the  laymen  are  welcome,  too — for  they  are 
putting  into  the  fight  the  business  sense  that  wins 
the  respect  of  our  opponents,  and  they  are  putting 
up  the  cash  which  is  making  great  nation-wide  cam- 
paigns possible. 

But  having  declared  myself  a  prohibitionist,  I 
want  to  make  haste  to  say  that  I  have  no  sympathy 
with  the  statement  that  all  saloon-keepers  and  bar- 
tenders are  low-browed  brutes.  Most  of  them  are 
workingmen  with  all  the  hopes  and  aspirations  of 
other  workingmen. 

Nor  do  I  find  myself  in  accord  with  the  declara- 


A  Confession  17 

tion  that  because  a  man  drinks  a  glass  of  beer  or  a 
cocktail,  he  is  of  necessity  a  person  of  low  character. 
I  know  some  mighty  fine  people  who  drink  beer  and 
cocktails — they  are  not  fine  because  they  do  so,  but 
in  spite  of  it,  and  yet  I  can't  get  away  from  the  fact 
that  most  of  them  are  just  about  as  sincere  as  are 
those  of  us  who  are  trying  to  take  away  the  thing 
which  seems  to  give  them  so  much  enjoyment. 

As  a  prohibitionist  I  want  to  remember  that  IVe 
got  to  live  with  these  neighbours  of  mine  after  the 
saloon  has  been  put  out  of  business,  and  I  don't 
want  to  say  or  do  anything  that  will  raise  a  barrier 
between  us  if  I  can  possibly  avoid  it.  Of  course,  if 
it  came  to  the  point  of  either  -sacrificing  their  friend- 
ship or  holding  on  to  the  saloon  with  all  that  this 
implies,  I'd  be  tempted  to  say  some  pretty  strong 
things  which  might  cause  my  neighbours  to  walk  on 
the  other  side  of  the  street  as  we  hustled  for  the 
7:26. 

But — this  isn't  likely  to  happen,  for  I  have  found 
these  neighbours  of  mine  who  do  indulge  occasion- 
ally in  strong  drink  to  be  pretty  reasonable  sort  of 
folks  after  all. 

And  so,  as  a  prohibitionist,  I'm  going  to  try 
through  courtesy  and  friendship  and  argument — and 
maybe  once  in  a  while  by  an  everlasting  wallop  of 
the  liquor  business  as  a  whole — to  win  men  to  my 
position. 

There's  another  reason  why  I  want  to  hold  on  to 
those  who  may  disagree  with  me — especially  those 


i8  Why  Prohibition! 

who  are  in  the  liquor  business :  It  would  be  foolish 
to  deny  that  considerable  business  ingenuity  will 
have  to  be  displayed  in  adjusting  the  transfer  of  the 
capital  now  invested  in  the  liquor  industry  to  more 
legitimate  industry,  but  it  would  be  still  more  absurd 
to  say  that  the  men  who  have  built  up  such  large 
interests  as  the  liquor  business  controls,  will  find 
themselves  helpless  when  the  nation  finally  decides 
that  "the  saloon  shall  go." 

For  some  of  the  best  brains  in  the  business  world 
are  now  engaged  in  producing  and  selling  intoxi- 
cating liquor,  and  while  there  are  many — too  many 
— men  in  this  industry  who  are  pretty  nearly  all  that 
their  enemies  say  they  are,  nevertheless,  there  are 
great  numbers  of  others  who  are  as  clean  in  their 
lives  and  as  square  in  their  business  dealings  as  one 
can  find  in  almost  any  other  business.  It  is  to  these 
that  the  State  and  the  liquor  industry  as  a  whole 
must  look  to  make  the  readjustment  which  is  inevi- 
table. 

These  men  will  make  some  quick  changes  when 
they  realise  that  their  plants  can  no  longer  be  used 
to  produce  wine,  beer  and  whiskey.  They  will  see 
to  it  better  than  anybody  else  can,  that  there  will  be 
a  minimum  of  loss  in  every  way.  It  would  be  a  gross 
undervaluation  of  their  business  abilities  to  say 
otherwise. 

When  these  men  undertake  this  task,  I  want  them 
to  see  that  I  am  with  them — and  if  there's  anything 


A  Confession  19 

I  can  do  to  boost  their  job  of  reconstruction,  I  want 
them  to  know  that  I  am  ready  to  do  the  boosting. 

As  a  prohibitionist  I  want  to  be  perfectly  fair 
to  the  men  and  women  who  are  most  vitally  and 
personally  concerned  about  this  whole  business,  and 
to  my  fellow-prohibitionists  I  want  to  point  out  what 
is  to  me  a  very  important  situation: 

An  analysis  of  the  dry  territory  throughout  the 
United  States  indicates  that  most  of  it  is  in  rural 
areas;  only  about  20  percent,  of  the  people  in  dry 
states  live  in  cities,  whereas  in  the  wet  states  about 
70  per  cent,  live  in  cities. 

From  1900  to  1910  the  population  of  the  United 
States  as  a  whole  increased  21  per  cent.,  but  the 
population  in  the  cities  of  25,000  and  over  increased 
over  55  per  cent.,  whereas  the  population  in  rural  dis- 
tricts increased  only  11.2  per  cent. 

One-tenth  of  all  the  people  in  this  country  live  in 
the  three  cities  of  New  York,  Philadelphia  and  Chi- 
cago. One-fourth  of  the  population  lives  in  the  30 
cities  of  200,000  and  over.  These  cities  occupy  only 
one-four-hundredth  of  the  total  land  area. 

One-fourth  of  all  the  people  in  the  United  States 
living  in  wet  territory  live  in  six  cities — New  York, 
Chicago,  Philadelphia,  St.  Louis,  Boston  and  Cleve- 
land— and  one-half  of  all  the  people  now  living  in 
licensed  territory  live  in  (four  states — New  York, 
Pennsylvania,  Illinois  and  New  Jersey. 

We  must  not  be  deceived  by  "dry  territory"  maps 
which  seem  to  indicate  that  the  fight  is  almost  fin- 


20  Why  Prohibition! 

ished.  It  isn't  a  question  of  merely  conquering  land 
areas — we're  after  men — and  most  of  those  in  un- 
conquered  territory  live  in  cities  which  do  not  cover 
much  land  area. 

I  know  that  if  thirty-six  states  vote  for  the  con- 
stitutional amendment  for  prohibition,  the  entire 
country  will  be  dry  forever,  for  it  would  require 
thirty-six  states  to  reverse  the  decision  to  destroy 
the  liquor  business — and  the  liquor  forces  could  not 
possibly  carry  thirty-six  states  at  any  time. 

And  the  prohibitionists  should  not  be  criticised  for 
availing  themselves  of  a  method  which  the  consti- 
tution itself  has  provided,  and  which  is  practically 
the  only  way  whereby  the  liquor  question  can  be  de- 
termined. 

However,  the  saloon  is  a  city  problem.  Saloons 
exist  almost  exclusively  in  the  city — they  are  rarely 
found  in  the  open  country  or  in  the  small  town. 
Furthermore,  the  saloon  is  a  workingman's  problem. 
Therefore,  so  far  as  immediate  results  are  con- 
cerned, the  saloon  chiefly  affects  city  people  and 
workingmen — and  these  must  be  largely  won  for 
prohibition  if  the  prohibition  law  is  to  prove  satis- 
factory and  permanent. 

And-»— workingmen  and  city  people  have  it  in  their 
power  to  settle  the  liquor  problem  aright  when  they 
are  convinced  that  the  arguments  of  the  prohibition- 
1st s  are  sound. 

The  people  living  in  places  where  the  saloons 
exist  should  see  most  quickly  the  dire  effects  of  the 


A  Confession  21 

liquor  traffic  when  they  are  intelligently  pointed  out 
to  them.  It  must  not  be  assumed  that  city  people 
and  workingmen  are  more  immoral  than  country 
people,  nor  that  they  'have  more  perverted  tastes  or 
inclinations,  and  that  they  are  incapable  of  properly 
deciding  the  liquor  question  for  themselves. 

It  is,  therefore,  reasonable  to  ask  that  a  campaign 
of  discussion  and  education  be  conducted  in  which 
the  actual  facts  be  presented,  so  that  when  prohi- 
bition is  enacted  a  very  considerable  majority  in  the 
city  will  believe  in  it,  because  they  have  been  con- 
vinced of  its  fairness  and  its  effectiveness. 

And  so,  standing  squarely  for  prohibition — but 
with  malice  toward  none  and  with  charity  toward 
all — here  goes  for  the  toughest  fight  that  I  can  put 
up  against  booze. 

CHARLES  STELZLE. 


II 

A  Challenge  to  America 

THERE  never  was  a  time  when  America  so  needed 
her  sober  senses  as  to-day — it  is  a  time  when  selfish- 
ness must  be  subordinated  to  the  great  task  of  win- 
ning the  war. 

We  are  being  told  by  those  who  have  come  from 
the  Front  that  we  in  this  country  haven't  begun  to 
feel  the  pinch  of  the  war.  Except  for  an  occasional 
parade  or  brass  band,  a  flag  raising,  a  Red  Cross 
or  Liberty  Loan  appeal  or  something  of  the  sort, 
it  doesn't  look  much  like  war  in  the  home  town. 

There  are  no  ruined  homes  nor  torpedoed  sky- 
scrapers and  churches.  Our  streets  are  just  as  they 
were  before,  and  we  go  out  to  our  lunches  as  we 
always  did. 

Most  of  us  flatter  ourselves  that,  if  we  have 
bought  a  fifty  dollar  Liberty  Bond,  we  have  made 
about  all  the  sacrifice  that  the  country  has  a  right  to 
ask  of  us. 

But — once  in  a  while,  when  the  boys  march  down 
the  street  with  flags  flashing  in  the  sunlight  and 
drums  throbbing,  we  get  a  tightening  of  the  throat 
and  there's  a  moment  when  the  picture  blurs. 


A  Challenge  to  America         23 

And — once  in  a  while  as  we  read  an  account  of 
how  the  "Huns"  outraged  unprotected  women  and 
children  there  wells  up  a  feeling  of  anger  and  re- 
sentment which  makes  us  feel  like  putting  our  fists 
through  something. 

Meanwhile,  some  of  the  finest  fellows  in  this  coun- 
try are  freely  giving  themselves  for  service  in  the 
trenches  and  on  the  sea  and  we  honour  them  because 
of  their  readiness  to  serve  their  country. 

Probably  millions  of  our  boys  will  go  to  the  Front 
before  the  war  ends,  to  do  their  level  best  to  stop 
the  tide  of  red  ruin  and  outrageous  killing. 

But  there's  one  fact  that  stands  out  clear  and 
sharp  as  we  take  a  world-wide  view  of  the  war — 
namely,  that  we've  got  to  reckon  not  only  with 
"Kaiser  Bill  Hohenzollern"  but  with  "Kaiser  John 
Barleycorn." 

Every  great  general  in  this  war — every  great 
strategist  who  has  had  the  courage  to  face  all  the 
facts  has  pointed  out  the  danger  of  drink. 

Lloyd  George  put  it  this  way: 

"We  arc  fighting  Germany,  Austria  and  drink,  and  as 
far  as  I  can  see,  the  greatest  of  the  three  deadly  foes  is 
drink." 

Marshal  Joffre  said: 

"Alcohol  by  diminishing  the  moral  and  material  strength 
of  the  Army,  is  a  crime  against  national  defence  in  the  face 
of  the  enemy." 


24  Why  Prohibition! 

"Men  with  drink  in  them  don't  fight — they 
brawl,"  said  Vance  Thompson.  "It  is  not  boldness 
men  get  out  of  drink,  what  they  get  is  the  fuddled 
logic  of  a  maniac." 

The  nations  at  war  very  soon  discovered  who  their 
real  enemy  was.  It  was  not  the  Teuton  and  the 
Turk — it  was  alcohol. 

And  so  France,  England  and  Russia  have  grap- 
pled with  their  arch-enemy — but  he  is  putting  up 
the  biggest  fight  in  his  history,  for  he  knows  that  if 
he  loses  out  in  this  war,  he  will  be  played  out  for- 
ever. 

Arthur  Mee,  who  is  the  organiser  of  a  movement 
in  Great  Britain  to  fight  the  liquor  traffic,  said  in  a 
little  book  entitled  "The  Fiddlers"  : 

"The  time  has  come  when  it  should  be  said  that  those 
responsible  for  our  country  now  stand  on  the  very  threshold 
of  eternal  glory,  or  eternal  shame.  They  play  and  palter 
with  the  greatest  enemy  fought  outside  Berlin.  Not  for 
one  hour  has  the  full  strength  of  Britain  been  turned  against 
her  enemy.  From  the  first  day  of  the  war  while  our  mighty 
Allies  have  been  striking  down  this  foe  within  their  gates, 
Britain  has  let  the  liquor  trade  stalk  through  her  streets, 
serving  the  Kaiser's  purposes,  and  paying  the  Government 
one  million  pounds  (five  million  dollars)  a  week  for  the 
right  to  do  it." 

And  here  are  some  striking  paragraphs  in  his 
strong  indictment  of  the  liquor  traffic: 


A  Challenge  to  America         25 

"We  must  not  eat  more  than  our  share  on  our  honour — 
but  the  man  across  the  table  can  eat  his  share  of  bread  and 
drink  somebody  else's  too." 

"We  must  eat  less  and  eat  slowly — so  that  brewers  may 
waste  more  and  waste  quickly." 

"God  speed  the  plough  and  the  woman  who  drives  it — 
yes,  and  God  help  the  woman  who  drives  the  plough  to  feed 
the  brewer  while  her  little  ones  cry  for  bread." 

So  it  is  everywhere — while  all  the  world  is  making 
sacrifices  and  trying  to  eliminate  waste,  liquor  wastes 
capital,  wastes  earnings,  wastes  man-power,  wastes 
foodstuffs,  wastes  human  efficiency  and  wastes  hu- 
man life. 

Food,  labor  and  life  are  the  chief  factors  in  win- 
ning the  war — but  the  liquor  men  are  wasting  all 
three. 

They  are  wasting  food: 

Last  year  in  the  United  States  the  waste  amounted 
to  7,000,000,000  pounds  of  foodstuffs — and  they 
have  no  right  to  starve  some  men  by  making  others 
drunk. 

They  are  wasting  labour: 

About  300,000  men  are  engaged  in  the  manufac- 
ture, sale  and  distribution  of  liquor — in  breweries, 
saloons  and  restaurants  as  brewers,  bartenders  and 
waiters — at  a  time  when  every  man  is  needed  in 
some  useful  occupation  to  help  win  the  war.  The 
labour  of  these  300,000  men  is  worse  than  wasted — 
no  possible  good  can  come  of  it,  but  much  harm  is 
done.  Nor  does  this  take  into  account  the  many 


26  Why  Prohibition! 

thousands  who  produce  the  materials  that  are  used 
in  making  liquor. 

They  are  wasting  life : 

Bartenders,  brewery  workers  and  waiters  in  sa- 
loons lose  an  average  of  six  years  of  life  on  account 
of  their  occupations.  If  the  300,000  men  who  make 
and  sell  booze  lose  an  average  of  six  years  of  life, 
it  makes  a  total  of  1,800,000  years  of  life.  The 
average  man  works  about  thirty  years — so  that  the 
liquor  traffic  is  using  up  the  equivalent  of  60,000 
men  in  each  generation — and  this  is  too  great  a  price 
for  the  nation  to  pay. 

For  these  reasons — first,  because  of  the  waste  of 
food;  second,  because  of  the  waste  of  labour;  third, 
because  of  the  waste  of  life,  we  have  a  right  to  de- 
mand that  the  liquor  business  be  abolished. 

"Food  will  win  the  war"  is  the  slogan  of  the  Food 
Conservation  Campaign — and  it's  probably  true.  If 
food  will  win  the  war,  the  liquor  men  who  are  food 
wasters  are  not  only  fighting  against  our  country, 
but  they  will  have  to  reckon  with  us  if  we  should 
lose  the  war. 

When  the  United  States  Senate's  Committee  on 
Agriculture  was  investigating  the  subject  of  food- 
stuffs, the  liquor  men  denied  that  they  consumed  as 
much  as  the  prohibitionists  said  they  did — they  de- 
clared that  they  used  only  one  per  cent,  of  the  grain. 

All  right — let's  take  them  at  their  word: 

One  per  cent,  of  the  grain  will  feed  one  per  cent, 
of  the  people.  This  means  one  million  people — 


A  Challenge  to  America          27 

because  there  are  100,000,000  of  us  in  this  country. 

We  shall  this  year  probably  send  1,000,000  sol- 
diers to  France. 

This  means  that  the  liquor  men  have  been  wasting 
enough  grain  to  feed  every  last  man  who  will  go  to 
the  trenches ! 

If  food  will  win  the  war — as  Hoover  says — then 
the  liquor  men  have  a  fearful  responsibility  resting 
vpon  them  when  they  deliberately  waste  the  food 
which  would  give  life  and  strength  to  our  soldiers. 

We  have  been  told  that  it  is  altogether  possible 
that  the  last  million  bushels  of  grain  will  be  the  de- 
termining factor  in  winning  the  war.  If  this  is  true, 
then  how  can  we  permit  the  liquor  business  to  waste 
enough  foodstuffs  to  feed  our  entire  Army  at  the 
Front  ? 

At  a  time  when  conservation  is  the  key-note  of 
victory,  it  seems  suicidal  to  permit  the  liquor  men  to 
waste  sugar,  molasses,  grain,  coal  and  railway  serv- 
ice, when  the  boys  at  the  Front  and  those  who  are 
standing  behind  them  need  the  very  best  that  this 
country  affords  in  order  to  win  the  war. 

We  deny  the  right  of  our  soldiers  to  drink  liquor 
— what  right  then  has  the  man  who  stays  at  home 
not  only  to  drink  all  the  booze  he  wants,  but  by  doing 
so  use  the  grain  that  should  go  into  the  soldiers' 
bread — the  soldier  who  has  gone  to  the  Front  to 
fight  for  the  life  of  the  boozer  who  remains  at 
home? 

America  will  need  to  conserve    every    ounce    of 


28  Why  Prohibition! 

energy,  every  dollar  of  capital  and  every  last  par- 
ticle of  strength.  Looked  at  in  the  most  lenient  light 
it  can  hardly  be  claimed  that  the  traffic  in  alcohol 
will  help  strengthen  America. 

And  this  is  our  biggest  job — those  of  us  who  have 
remained  at  home. 

Even  in  normal  times  the  question  of  food  pro- 
duction has  become  a  very  serious  one  in  this  coun- 
try. It's  hard  for  most  of  us  to  understand  that 
it  isn't  money  weVe  got  to  save,  but  food,  and  it  re- 
quires greater  moral  courage  to  save  food  than  it 
does  money. 

We  have  gotten  the  notion  that  if  we  have  good 
incomes,  food  scarcity  can't  hurt  us.  This  is  be- 
cause we  have  associated  starvation  with  poverty. 

But  maybe  some  day  we'll  wake  up  to  the  fact  that 
we  can't  eat  cash — and  that  food  conservation  is  a 
necessity  no  matter  how  much  money  we  may 
have. 

For  you  may  be  sure  that  if  we  ever  face  an  ex- 
treme scarcity  of  food,  somebody  will  see  to  it  that 
the  very  poor  will  have  an  equal  chance  at  what  food 
there  may  be  on  hand,  and  it  is  altogether  possible 
that  those  who  have  money  will  fare  no  better  than 
those  who  haven't.  More  wheat  must  be  conserved. 
While  it  is  true  that  comparatively  little  wheat  is 
used  in  making  liquor,  its  conservation  depends 
largely  upon  the  more  general  use  by  all  the  people 
of  the  grains  now  wasted  by  the  liquor  men. 

The  latest  report  giving  the  total  of  last  year's 


A  Challenge  to  America         29 

(1917)  wheat  crop  in  the  United  States  and  in  a 
dozen  or  more  other  wheat  producing  countries, 
shows  that  it  was  smaller  than  the  1916  crop  and 
i$%  smaller  than  the  average  for  the  preceding  five 
years.  Nor  does  this  take  into  account  the  very  con- 
siderable quantity  of  wheat  lost  through  fires,  sub- 
marine and  mine  sinkings. 

While  the  estimate  made  by  the  Department  of 
'Agriculture  last  December  showed  that  there  was 
an  increase  of  4%  over  last  year  in  the  acreage  used 
for  wheat  production,  the  condition  of  the  crop  was 
so  poor  as  to  probably  result  in  an  output  of  10% 
below  the  ten  years  average. 

With  the  shifting  of  large  numbers  of  farmers  to 
the  battlefields  in  France,  and  to  the  munition  fac- 
tories in  cities  where  they  are  getting  big  wages, 
there  are  fewer  men  than  ever  engaged  in  raising 
wheat — to  say  nothing  about  other  food  products 
— and  the  chances  are  that  there's  going  to  be  great 
difficulty  in  harvesting  even  the  reduced  crop  of 
wheat  that  we  shall  raise  this  year. 

The  increase  in  the  population  of  this  country  has 
been  three  times  as  great  as  the  average  increase  in 
wheat  production  during  the  past  ten  years  over  the 
average  production  for  the  ten  preceding  years.  We 
are  failing  to  keep  pace  in  wheat  production  with 
the  normal  increase  of  population.  If  this  contin- 
ues, it  doesn't  require  an  expert  statistician  to  tell  us 
where  we  are  coming  out. 

One  of  the  most  significant  memorials  ever  pre- 


30  Why  Prohibition! 

sented  on  any  subject  was  that  signed  by  about 
twenty-five  hundred  of  Great  Britain's  greatest  lead- 
ers— representing  the  Army  and  Navy,  the  Control- 
lers and  Directors  of  Munitions  of  War,  the  Privy 
Council  and  both  houses  of  Parliament,  the  public 
service  of  the  nation  and  empire,  the  trade,  commerce 
and  the  great  industries,  municipalities  and  justice, 
science,  education  and  public  health,  art,  literature, 
music  and  the  drama  and  all  ranks  of  social  service. 
Here  are  some  of  the  most  striking  paragraphs 
in  this  remarkable  memorial : 

"We,  citizens  of  the  United  Kingdom,  appeal  to  the  Gov- 
ernment to  put  the  nation  on  its  full  strength. 

"Now  that  the  nation  has  followed  the  example  of  our 
Allies  in  enrolling  its  full  manhood,  we  appeal  that  we  may 
range  ourselves  with  our  greatest  Allies  and  put  on  the 
whole  armour  of  Britain.  The  power  exerted  by  alcohol 
cuts  through  the  efficiency  of  the  nation;  it  weakens  our 
fighting  forces  and  must  lengthen  the  war.  These  facts 
stand  out  concerning  this  powerful  trade: 

"It  hinders  the  Army :  it  is  the  cause  of  grave  delay  with 
munitions;  it  keeps  thousands  of  men  from  war  work  every 
day,  and  makes  good  sober  workmen  second-rate. 

"It  hampers  the  Navy;  it  delays  transports,  places  them 
at  the  mercy  of  submarines,  slows  down  repairs,  and  con- 
gests the  docks. 

"It  threatens  our  mercantile  marine;  it  has  absorbed  dur- 
ing the  war  over  two  hundred  million  cubic  feet  of  space, 
and  it  retards  tbe  building  of  ships  to  replace  our  losses. 

"It  destroys  our  food  supplies;  since  the  war  began  it 
has  consumed  over  3,500,000  tons  of  food,  with  sugar 


A  Challenge  to  America          31 

enough  to  last  the  nation  100  days.  It  uses  up  more  sugar 
than  the  Army. 

"It  wastes  our  financial  strength ;  since  the  war  began 
our  people  have  spent  on  alcohol  over  four  hundred  million 
pounds. 

"It  diverts  the  nation's  strength;  it  uses  500,000  work- 
ers, 1,000,000  acres  of  land,  and  1,500,000  tons  of  coal  a 
year;  and  during  the  war  it  has  involved  the  lifting  and 
handling  on  road  and  rail  of  a  weight  equal  to  50,000,000 
tons. 

"It  shatters  our  moral  strength ;  its  temptations  to  women 
involve  grave  danger  to  children  and  anxiety  to  thousands 
of  soldiers. 

"Nearly  two  years  have  passed  since  the  King  banished 
this  source  of  national  weakness  from  his  household;  since 
engineers,  manufacturers  of  explosives,  admirals,  directors 
of  naval  equipment,  urged  the  Government  to  banish  it 
from  the  nation;  since  the  Director  of  Transports  appealed 
for  the  withdrawal  of  all  drink  licenses  for  the  sake  of  the 
Army  and  Navy;  and  since  the  Shipbuilders'  Federation 
declared  that  'with  the  total  abolition  of  drink  the  work 
would  go  with  a  swing,  and  you  would  get  as  fine  work 
in  our  yards  and  shops  as  in  the  trenches/  Yet  the  alcohol 
brake  is  still  on  our  workshops. 

"We  are  convinced  that  the  dangers  confronting  us  arise 
from  the  sudden  possession  of  abundant  wages  rather  than 
from  a  lack  of  patriotic  feeling;  untrained  in  spending  or 
in  thrift,  large  numbers  of  our  workers  waste  their  reserves 
in  drink.  The  greatest  good  a  Government  can  render  to 
its  people  is  to  strengthen  their  right  purposes  and  weaken 
the  power  of  their  temptations  and  there  lies  upon  us  now 
the  double  duty  of  protecting  our  people  from  the  tempta- 


32  Why  Prohibition! 

tion  to  drink  away  their  earnings,  and  of  protecting  the 
State  from  the  intolerable  folly  of  high  war  wages  turned 
to  the  advantage  of  our  enemies. 

"With  the  resources  of  the  nation  taxed  to  their  utmost, 
the  waste  of  five  hundred  thousand  pounds  a  day  on  alcohol 
is  a  fact  of  pitiful  significance.  With  their  high  wages  our 
people  dig  pits  of  sorrow  instead  of  building  up  reserves 
of  power  and  independence;  children  die  faster  of  neglect, 
and  a  City  Missionary  has  received  forty  appeals  from  the 
trenches  to  look  after  wives  'going  wrong'  through  drink. 

"If  it  is  said  we  need  the  revenue  the  State  derives  from 
alcohol,  the  answer  lies  in  these  things.  No  nation  can 
make  a  profit  from  such  a  trade  as  this.  But  the  fear  for 
the  revenue  is  shattered  by  the  noble  action 'of  our  Allies 
and  Dominions;  of  Russia,  which  has  prohibited  vodka;  of 
France,  which  has  prohibited  absinthe  and  the  sale  of  spirits 
to  women,  soldiers,  and  young  people;  and  of  parts  of  our 
Dominions,  especially  in  Canada,  where  the  sale  of  alcohol 
is  rapidly  disappearing,  followed  by  the  closing  of  prisons 
and  the  quickening-up  of  life. 

"Russia,  wanting  strength  and  money  too,  has  found 
both  in  prohibition.  The  saving  power  of  her  people  has 
risen  from  shillings  to  pounds.  The  banks  that  received 
one  hundred  and  eighty  thousand  pounds  in  January  before 
the  war,  received  in  January,  1915,  five  million  six  hun- 
dred thousand  pounds,  and  in  January,  1916,  twelve  million 
pounds.  The  industrial  efficiency  of  Russia  has  increased 
by  30  per  cent.,  and  an  increase  of  10  per  cent,  in  our  effi- 
ciency would  replace  our  revenue  from  drink. 

"More  serious  still  is  the  peril  of  the  child-life  of  the 
State.  It  is  perishing  faster  than  in  times  of  peace.  Our 
brave  ally,  France,  with  the  enemy  almost  at  the  gates  of 


A  Challenge  to  America          33 

Paris,  won  for  itself  the  enduring  distinction  of  the  lowest 
infant  death-rate  ever  recorded  in  its  capital.  What  Paris 
can  do  can  be  done  in  our  own  towns  if  the  same  patriotic 
devotion  be  shown  by  our  own  people,  and  if  all  removable 
dangers  to  child-life  be  removed.  Chief  among  these  dan- 
gers is  alcohol. 

"No  source  of  weakness  under  our  control  is  so  wide- 
spread ;  none  is  more  vital  to  the  safety  of  the  State  in  war 
and  its  welfare  in  peace.  But  the  dangers  of  alcohol  are 
tenfold  now. 

"We  are  no  temperance  reformers  as  such.  We  stand 
for  the  great  desire  of  all  good  people  to  strike  the  mightiest 
blow  for  freedom  of  which  Britain  is  capable.  We  support 
the  demand  for  prohibition  made  to  the  Government  by  its 
own  investigators,  and  by  the  Shipbuilders'  deputation,  with 
not  a  teetotaler  among  them,  in  March,  1915.  Believing 
in  the  Prime  Minister's  words,  that  'no  sacrifice  is  too  great 
when  freedom  and  honour  are  at  stake,'  and  that  rich  and 
poor  alike  should  bear  it,  we  ask  the  Government  to  with- 
draw all  drink  licenses  throughout  the  Kingdom  for  the 
period  of  the  war. 

"We  believe  a  golden  moment  has  arrived  for  our  coun- 
try; that,  prepared  for  sacrifice  by  the  example  of  the  King 
and  Lord  Kitchener,  the  nation  is  ready  for  the  natural 
step  that  France  and  Russia  have  already  taken.  The  sus- 
pension of  the  liquor  traffic  during  the  war,  the  conversion 
of  the  public-houses  into  houses  of  refreshment,  will  quicken 
up  our  civil  and  fighting  populations,  will  raise  a  new  fire 
of  resolution  in  our  people,  and  will  give  to  millions  the 
first  opportunity  they  have  ever  had  of  breaking  old  habits 
of  weakness  and  forming  new  habits  of  strength. 

"We  believe  that  in  this,  as  in  all  other  vital  issues,  there 


34  Why  Prohibition! 

must  be  sympathy  of  purpose  and  unity  of  action  between 
the  Allied  Nations;  and  we  appeal  to  the  Government  to 
be  bold  and  trust  our  people,  to  be  strong  and  follow  our 
Allies,  to  be  worthy  of  the  mighty  destinies  they  hold  in 
solemn  trust." 


These  men  have  had  the  courage  to  face  the  facts 
and  to  make  them  public. 

And  needless  to  say  they  have  encountered  ter- 
rific opposition. 

It  seems  that  all  the  powers  of  the  liquor  men 
have  been  hurled  at  the  head  of  the  British  Govern- 
ment to  keep  it  from  absolutely  destroying  their 
business. 

But  what  about  America  ? 

Dare  we  shirk  a  duty  which  is  plainly  ours  espe- 
cially in  view  of  what  our  Allies  have  done — or  what 
they  are  earnestly  trying  to  do? 

The  liquor  traffic  is  probably  not  so  strongly  en- 
trenched here  as  it  is  in  England  and  in  some  other 
countries,  but  it's  going  to  be  no  easy  fight  to  put 
"John  Barleycorn"  on  the  shelf — and  keep  him 
there. 

This  is  no  new  quarrel  with  the  liquor  men — nor 
is  the  contention  for  war-time  prohibition  a  novelty. 

Nearly  a  century  and  a  half  ago  in  this  country 
the  Continental  Congress  passed  a  law  looking  to- 
ward the  conservation  of  food  products  by  stopping 
the  use  of  grain  in  the  manufacture  of  liquor. 

Here  it  is: 


A  Challenge  to  America          35 

"Resolved,  That  it  be  recommended  to  the  several  legis- 
latures of  the  United  States  immediately  to  pass  laws  the 
most  effectual  for  putting  an  immediate  stop  to  the  perni- 
cious practice  of  distilling  grain." 

And  this  was  before  the  advent  of  the  saloon  with 
all  its  debasing  influence.  It  was  before  drunken- 
ness was  looked  upon  as  a  disgrace,  before  the 
Church  looked  upon  it  with  disfavour  and  before 
employers  of  labour  discriminated  against  the 
drinker. 

This  early  legislation  for  the  conservation  of 
foodstuffs  sets  a  mighty  good  example  to  be  followed 
by  the  successors  in  Congress  of  patriots  like  Benja- 
min Franklin,  Samuel  Adams,  Patrick  Henry  and 
those  who,  associated  with  them,  stood  for  this 
"bone-dry  legislation." 

In  a  speech  delivered  by  Abraham  Lincoln  before 
the  Washingtonians  at  Springfield,  Illinois,  he  said: 

"Of  our  political  revolution  of  '76  we  are  all  justly 
proud.  It  has  given  us  a  degree  of  political  freedom  far 
exceeding  that  of  any  other  nation  of  the  earth.  In  it  the 
world  has  found  a  solution  of  the  long-mooted  problem  as 
to  the  capability  of  man  to  govern  himself.  In  it  was  the 
germ  which  has  vegetated,  and  still  is  to  grow  and  expand 
into  the  universal  liberty  of  mankind.  But,  with  all  these 
glorious  results,  past,  present,  and  to  come,  it  had  its  evils 
too.  It  breathed  forth  famine,  swam  in  blood,  and  rode  in 
fire ;  and  long,  long  after,  the  orphan's  cry  and  the  widow's 
wail  continued  to  break  the  sad  silence  that  ensued.  These 


36  Why  Prohibition! 

were  the  price,  the  inevitable  price,  paid  for  the  blessings 
it  brought. 

"Turn  now  to  the  temperance  revolution.  In  it  we  shall 
find  a  stronger  bondage  broken,  a  viler  slavery  manumitted, 
a  greater  tyrant  deposed ;  in  it,  more  of  want  supplied,  more 
disease  healed,  more  sorrow  assuaged.  By  it  no  orphans 
starving,  no  widows  weeping.  By  it,  none  wounded  in  feel- 
ing, none  injured  in  interest;  even  the  dram-maker  and 
dram-seller  will  have  glided  into  other  occupations  so  grad- 
ually as  never  to  have  felt  the  change,  and  will  stand  ready 
to  join  all  others  in  the  universal  song  of  gladness.  And 
what  a  noble  ally  this  to  the  cause  of  political  freedom; 
with  such  an  aid  its  march  cannot  fail  to  be  on  and  on,  till 
every  son  of  earth  shall  drink  in  rich  fruition  the  sorrow- 
quenching  draughts  of  perfect  liberty.  Happy  day  when — 
all  appetites  controlled,  all  poisons  subdued,  all  matter  sub- 
jected— mind,  all  conquering  mind,  shall  live  and  move,  the 
monarch  of  the  world.  Glorious  consummation! 

"And  when  the  victory  shall  be  complete — when  there 
shall  be  neither  a  slave  nor  a  drunkard  on  the  earth — how 
proud  the  title  of  that  land  which  may  truly  claim  to  be 
the  birthplace  and  the  cradle  of  both  those  revolutions  that 
shall  have  ended  in  the  victory.  How  nobly  distinguished 
that  people  who  shall  have  planted  and  nurtured  to  maturity 
both  the  political  and  moral  freedom  of  their  species." 

On  the  eve  of  their  departure  for  France.  37,000 
troops  were  addressed  in  a  letter  by  Major  General 
•John  F.  O'Ryan  as  follows: 

"This  letter  is  a  personal  appeal  to  your  intelligence  and 
better  self  to  refrain  from  using  liquor  in  any  form  through- 
out the  period  of  your  service.  The  plea  contained  in  this 


A  Challenge  to  America         37 

letter  is  based  upon  principles  of  scientific  military  manage- 
ment. Our  job  is  to  whip  the  enemy  hard  and  with  the 
least  loss  to  ourselves.  In  training  our  military  machine  to 
do  this  we  must  eliminate  backlash,  rattles  and  useless  loads. 
We  must  have  every  part  healthy  and  strong,  and  depend- 
able, not  part  defective,  diseased  or  obsolete. 

"This  cannot  be  if  we  are  to  permit  'booze'  in  any  form 
into  our  military  machine.  Alcohol,  whether  you  call  it 
beer,  wine,  whisky  or  by  any  other  name,  is  a  breeder  of 
inefficiency.  While  it  affects  men  differently  the  results  are 
the  same,  in  that  all  affected  by  it  cease  for  the  time  to  be 
normal.  Some  become  forgetful,  others  quarrelsome.  Some 
become  noisy,  some  get  sick,  some  get  sleepy;  others  have 
their  passions  greatly  stimulated.  When  you  stop  to  con- 
sider the  thousands  in  a  division,  do  you  not  see  how  vital 
to  efficiency  is  the  elimination  of  liquor?  How  can  a  di- 
vision of  troops  be  ever  ready — ever  up  on  the  bit  to  drive 
ahead  or  to  thrust  back  the  enemy's  drive,  if  through  the 
presence  of  this  insidious  evil  some  soldiers  forget  their 
orders,  or  become  noisy  when  silence  is  essential,  fall  asleep 
when  every  faculty  should  be  alert?" 

And  here  is  what  General  Pershing  said  just  be- 
fore leaving  this  country  at  the  laying  of  the  corner 
stone  of  the  Y.  M.  C.  A.  Building  at  Fort  McKin- 
ley: 

"There  was  a  time  when  it  was  a  natural  part  of  a 
soldier's  existence  to  drink  and  carouse.  That  day  is  past 
with  the  soldier  sworn  to  defend  his  country's  flag  and 
representing  the  power  and  dignity  of  the  nation. 

"Strong  muscles,  clear  brains,  high  ideals  in  the  soldier, 
increase  the  fighting  efficiency  of  the  Army,  and  these  qual- 


38  Why  Prohibition! 

ities  of  the  citizen  insure  the  permanency  of  our  institutions. 
"The  Army  is  looked  upon  as  representing  the  common 
people  from  which  it  springs,  and  the  people  here  watch  our 
conduct  and  study  the  character  of  every  one  of  us.  This 
thought  should  be  an  inspiration  to  patriotism,  to  manliness, 
and  to  righteousness." 

There  is  no  doubt  that  the  military  men  who  are 
in  charge  of  the  boys  at  the  Front  will  take  good 
care  that  booze  does  not  destroy  the  effectiveness  of 
our  fighting  men. 

Wherever  American  Officers  are  in  complete  con- 
trol at  the  Front,  practical  prohibition  prevails 
among  our  soldiers. 

We  can  trust  our  men  with  such  leadership — our 
real  problem  is  with  the  man  who  stays  at  home. 

Will  he  take  his  part  by  living  the  sacrificial  life — 
although  it  seems  like  a  mighty  small  sacrifice  to 
give  up  a  cocktail  or  a  glass  of  beer  for  the  sake  of 
helping  to  win  the  greatest  war  in  the  history  of  the 
world. 

Those  of  us  who  remain  behind  may  dig  the  big- 
gest trench  in  the  world — a  trench  that  will  stop 
the  liquor  traffic  forever. 

This  is  a  war  within  a  war — a  battlefield  right 
here  at  home,  and  it  calls  for  fighters  and  martyrs 
— it's  a  question  of  whether  we're  big  enough  to 
stand  the  test. 

If  England  and  France  have  not  accomplished  all 
that  they  hoped  in  their  prohibition  program,  this 


A  Challenge  to  America         39 

is  no  good  reason  why  America  should  halt  in  put- 
ting through  a  policy  which  we  know  is  imperative 
if  the  war  is  to  be  won  soon. 

Nor  does  it  matter  whether  Englishmen  and 
Frenchmen  have  a  rum  ration  in  their  armies — we 
have  a  prohibition  Army  and  a  prohibition  Navy  and 
we're  proud  of  both. 

It's  going  to  be  demonstrated  that  our  boys  will 
put  up  as  fine  a  fight  against  the  enemy  as  any  Army 
which  depends  upon  liquor  to  give  it  spirit  and 
strength — there's  no  doubt  that  our  boys  will  give  a 
good  account  of  themselves  in  this  particular. 

It  would  be  easy  enough  to  become  maudlin  or 
sentimental  in  a  discussion  of  the  effect  of  liquor — 
but  it  isn't  necessary — as  reasonable  men  and  women 
all  we  need  is  the  facts  as  to  the  extent  and  general 
influence  of  the  liquor  business  and  the  general  social 
and  economic  conditions  which  are  produced  through 
indulgence  in  strong  drink. 

Professor  Irving  Fisher,  of  Yale  University,  said 
in  a  brief  argument  for  war-time  prohibition: 

"Every  reason  for  prohibition  in  times  of  peace  is  multi- 
plied during  war,  and  war  removes  or  weakens  almost  every 
argument  against  it.  These  facts  explain  why  so  many 
thoughtful  and  conservative  men  who  have  hitherto  been 
against  prohibition  advocate  it  now  as  a  war  measure. 

"In  times  of  peace  the  liquor  interests  argue  that  they 
greatly  extend  the  farmers'  market  for  grain,  but  the  war 
has  brought  a  world  food  crisis,  short  crops,  devastation  of 
wheat  fields,  destruction  of  grain  by  the  submarines  and 


4O  Why  Prohibition! 

withdrawal  of  men  from  agriculture  to  battlefields  and 
munition  works. 

"America  must  feed  Europe,  yet  we  have  been  compla- 
cently eating  up  our  own  food  stocks  and  therefore  have 
not  yet  realised  that  for  the  first  time  in  our  history,  we, 
too,  are  about  to  face  food  shortage.  Only  those  closest  to 
the  facts  like  Mr.  Hoover  realise  this  fully.  Hunger  and 
food  riots  are  possible  unless  heroic  measures  are  applied. 
Consequently  childhood  is  asked  to  forego  its  pleasures  by 
planting  a  plot  for  the  honour  of  the  flag. 

"Prohibition,  by  keeping  sober  one  or  two  hundred  thou- 
sand men  now  incapacitated  each  day  by  drunkenness  and 
by  increasing  the  productive  power  of  those  who  while  not 
drunk,  are  slowed  down  by  alcohol,  would  speed  up  pro- 
duction probably  at  least  10  per  cent.  It  follows  that  the 
more  than  two  billions  now  spent  on  alcohol  and  the  more 
than  two  billions  of  national  income  which  prohibition 
would  bring,  could  all  be  paid  in  taxes  without  making  the 
people  one  cent  poorer. 

"For  the  life,  health  and  efficiency  of  the  men  in  the 
military,  industrial  and  agricultural  arms  of  the  national 
service,  for  the  conservation  of  foodstuffs  and  for  the  sound- 
ness of  our  fiscal  policy,  we  need  war  prohibition." 

The  National  Service  and  War-time  Commis- 
sions of  the  American  Churches,  in  May,  1918,  sent 
the  following  message  to  the  President  and  to  the 
Congress  of  the  United  States: 

"Our  Nation  has,  we  profoundly  believe,  with  clean 
hands  and  pure  heart  engaged  in  conflict  for  lofty  and  un- 
selfish ends. 


A  Challenge  to  America         41 

"The  attainment  of  those  ends  demands  all  the  moral 
powers  of  our  people,  the  conservation  of  our  economic 
resources,  and  the  highest  efficiency  in  service. 

"These  powers  are  impaired,  this  efficiency  is  greatly 
decreased,  and  our  national  vitality  diminished  by  the  liquor 
traffic  and  all  its  attendant  evils  resulting  in  the  waste  of 
food,  and  the  waste  of  life  itself. 

"Having  duly  recognised  this  in  our  army  and  navy  by 
having  taken  measures  to  prevent  the  use  of  liquor  by  our 
troops,  we  believe  that  those  who  remain  and  serve  at  home 
should  willingly  apply  to  themselves  the  same  principles 
which  they  apply  to  our  soldiers  and  sailors  and  should 
submit  to  the  same  limitations  for  the  welfare  of  the  nation. 

"Therefore,  in  the  interest  of  those  who  defend  our  na- 
tion, for  the  saving  of  our  own  supplies  of  food,  for  the 
highest  efficiency  of  the  industries  which  provide  our  means 
of  warfare,  and  for  the  strengthening  of  the  moral  health 
of  the  people,  we  earnestly  urge  the  President  and  the  Con- 
gress of  the  United  States  to  take  steps  to  prevent,  during 
the  entire  period  of  the  war,  by  whatever  means  are  feasible, 
the  manufacture  and  sale  of  intoxicating  liquor  of  all  kinds 
for  use  as  a  beverage,  including  the  importation  of  liquor." 

America  practically  holds  in  her  hands  the  future 
of  the  liquor  traffic  throughout  the  world.  What 
she  does  with  her  foodstuffs  may  determine  the  des- 
tiny of  the  liquor  business  in  the  countries  of  our 
Allies.  They  are  watching  our  action  with  intense 
interest. 

Have  we  the  courage  to  destroy  the  enemy  within 
our  gates,  who  is  stealing  away  our  brains,  weaken- 


42  Why  Prohibition! 

ing  our  brawn,  and  making  flabby  the  morale  of  our 
nation  at  a  time  when  all  forward-looking  men 
should  be  fighting  to  "make  the  world  safe  for 
democracy"  ? 


Ill 

How  Much  do  We  Spend  for  Liquor? 

You  have  heard  it  said  that  we  spend  every  year 
in  this  country  two  billion  dollars  for  liquor. 

Two  billion  dollars! 

You  can't  even  guess  how  much  money  this  is — 
mostly  because  mighty  few  of  us  have  ever  handled 
more  than  two  hundred  dollars  at  any  one  time. 

Just  for  the  fun  of  it,  let's  write  it  this  way: 

$2,000,000,  ooo.oo. 

All  you  can  say  is  that  it  is  a  lot  of  money. 

But  perhaps  you  will  get  a  better  idea  of  how 
much  it  is  by  comparing  our  drink  bill  with  some 
other  bills  in  the  United  States. 

So  here  goes — 

It's  three  times  as  much  as  we  spend  to  maintain 
all  of  our  public  schools. 

It's  one-fourth  more  than  the  total  assets  of  the 
over  7,000  building  and  loan  associations  in  this 
country. 

It's  twice  the  capital  in  all  the  national  banks. 

It's  one-tenth  the  value  of  all  farm  property,  in- 
cluding land,  buildings,  machinery  and  animals. 

It's  as  much  as  it  costs  to  operate  all  our  railroads. 

43 


44  Why  Prohibition! 

It's  as  much  as  we  raised  for  the  first  Liberty 
Loan. 

It's  almost  twice  the  value  of  all  church  property 
in  the  United  States. 

We  Americans  spend  $3,800  every  minute  of  the 
day  for  liquor.  That's  the  price  of  a  fairly  com- 
fortable home  for  the  average  workingman. 

What  does  it  mean  to  throw  away  a  working- 
man's  home  every  minute  of  the  day  for  twenty-four 
hours?  It  means  1,440  homes  every  day.  It  means 
535,600  every  year. 

Counting  five  persons  to  a  home,  it  means  that 
nearly  3,000,000  persons  could  be  comfortably 
housed  on  the  amount  we  waste  on  drink  every  year. 

It  was  said  just  before  the  present  war  that  ours 
is  a  "billion  dollar  government" — that  is,  we  spent 
one  billion  dollars  a  year  to  run  the  various  depart- 
ments of  the  Federal  Government  in  peace  times. 
But  we  spent  for  liquor  just  twice  the  amount  of  our 
bill  for  the  support  of  the  Government. 

Before  we  entered  the  war  we  were  spending 
$250,000,000  a  year  for  national  defense.  But  our 
drink  bill  was  just  eight  times  as  much. 

Before  the  war  we  were  spending  a  little  over 
$66,000,000  a  year  on  the  administrative  work  of 
our  government.  But  our  annual  bill  for  drink  was 
practically  thirty  times  as  much. 

Before  the  war  we  were  spending  $200,000,000 
a  year  for  the  conservation  of  our  natural  resources, 
the  maintenance  of  rivers  and  harbors,  public  health 


How  Much  Spent  for  Liquor?      45 

and  education,  and  things  of  a  similar  nature.  At 
the  same  time  we  were  spending  every  year  ten  times 
as  much  on  liquor. 

The  liquor  bill  of  this  country  just  about  equals 
the  wages  earned  by  all  the  trade  unionists  in  the 
United  States. 

According  to  a  study  made  before  the  War  by  the 
Bureau  of  Statistics  of  the  New  York  State  Depart- 
ment of  Labor,  the  average  yearly  earnings  of  trade 
unionists  in  that  state,  including  men  and  women, 
amount  to  $750.  This  would  be  a  fair  average  for 
the  entire  country,  counting  only  days  actually  worked. 

We  spend  annually  $2,000,000,000  for  liquor. 
Divide  750  into  2,000,000,000  and  you  get  2,666,- 
666,  which  almost  equals  the  number  of  trade  union- 
ists of  various  kinds  in  this  country. 

The  enormous  waste  of  the  money  spent  for  liquor 
becomes  impressive  when  one  considers  that  it  equals 
the  total  sum  of  money  paid  to  this  highly  intelligent 
army  of  workers — the  finest  body  of  workers  in  the 
world. 

We  spend  just  about  as  much  for  intoxicating 
liquor  each  year  as  we  do  for  bread  and  clothing. 
We  can  get  along  without  the  liquor,  but  we  all  need 
bread  and  clothing. 

Just  for  the  fun  of  it,  ask  the  next  man  you  talk 
to  on  the  saloon  question,  how  much  money  one 
would  be  compelled  to  place  upon  each  word  in  the 
English  Bible  in  order  to  cover  the  total  amount  of 
money  spent  for  booze  in  this  country  each  year. 


46  Why  Prohibition! 

The  average  person  will  timidly  venture  the  sum 
of  ten  cents,  while  the  reckless  will  boldly  declare 
that  $1.00  will  surely  do  it. 

Actually,  it  would  be  necessary  to  place  upon  each 
word  of  the  English  Bible  $2,582  in  order  to  reach 
the  sum  of  $2,000,000,000 — the  amount  which  we 
spend  for  liquor.  There  are  said  to  be  774,692 
words  in  the  Bible. 

1  'In  the  beginning,  God"  the  first  four  words  in 
the  Bible,  would  be  worth,  upon  this  basis,  over 
$10,000  in  booze. 

"For  God  so  loved  the  world  that  he  gave  his  only 
begotten  son,  that  whosoever  believeth  on  him 
should  not  perish  but  have  everlasting  life"  would 
require  about  $70,000. 

Liquor  men  are  most  interesting  when  they  dis- 
cuss economic  questions.  Here's  an  example  of 
what  one  of  their  leading  lights  is  putting  out  for 
public  consumption: 

"As  a  sample  of  the  worthless  character  of  Prohibition 
statistics,  consider  the  claim  of  dry  editors  and  orators  in 
regard  to  the  drink  bill  of  the  United  States.  They  sol- 
emnly tell  us  that  we  spend  $2,000,000,000  for  alcoholic 
beverages  every  year.  Having  made  this  assertion,  they 
start  in  to  tell  us  what  this  money  would  buy  if  we  spent 
it  for  other  things.  .  .  .  They  overlook  the  fact  that  all 
the  money  spent  for  liquor  remains  in  circulation  and  is 
spent  for  other  things.  It  finds  its  way  into  the  tills  of 
the  merchants  and  vaults  of  the  bankers  through  the  hands 
of  the  bartenders,  the  saloonkeepers,  the  brewers,  the  dis- 


How  Much  Spent  for  Liquor?      47 

tillers.  .  .  .  The  talk  about  this  money  being  wasted  is 
nothing  but  dry  rot,  and  the  statistics  which  support  such 
nonsense,  pure  moonshine." 

So  "all  the  money  spent  for  liquor  remains  in  cir- 
culation?" Sure  it  does!  So  does  all  the  money 
spent  for  hiring  gunmen,  cutting  throats,  carrying 
on  the  white  slave  business,  gambling,  and  about 
everything  else  that  is  corrupting  men  and  women. 

The  fact  is,  that's  what  most  of  these  things  are 
done  for — to  put  more  of  the  other  fellow's  money 
into  circulation,  just  so  that  it  may  finally  reach  the 
pockets  of  liquor  men — and  the  crooks  and  murder- 
ers guilty  of  the  crimes  just  mentioned. 

The  two  billion  dollars  may  be  spent  for  "other 
things" — but  they're  spent  for  booze  first. 

And  that  particular  two  billion  dollars  will  never 
be  spent  again!  Everybody  knows  that  you  can't 
spend  your  money  and  have  it,  too. 

When  you  happen  to  get  for  your  week's  wages 
the  same  coin  that  you  got  last  week,  you  aren't 
foolish  enough  to  believe  that  you're  getting  "the 
same  money" — just  because  your  last  week's  wages 
came  back  to  you." 

A  dollar  may  be  spent  again  and  again  by  differ- 
ent individuals,  but  it  can  only  buy  one  thing  at  a 
time.  If  it  buys  booze,  it  doesn't  matter  what  the 
saloonkeeper  who  gets  it,  spent  it  for — a  dollar  has 
been  wasted  because  if  it  had  been  spent  for  those 
"other  things"  in  the  first  place,  the  extra  demand 


48  Why  Prohibition! 

for  those  things  would  have  increased  production 
by  just  that  amount. 

If  you  are  being  fooled  by  the  idea  that  the  "wet" 
and  "dry"  fight  in  this  country  means  nothing  to  you 
— that  it  doesn't  affect  your  interests  one  way  or  the 
other — 

If  you  are  being  lulled  to  sleep  by  the  dope  of  the 
liquor  men  that  the  town  is  prosperous  and  therefore 
you  can  afford  to  "let  well  enough  alone" — 

If  you  are  being  deceived  by  the  thought  that  be- 
cause you  don't  patronise  the  saloon  it  can't  hurt 
you — 

If  you  are  foolishly  generous  in  the  conviction 
that  because  you  don't  drink  booze  is  no  good  reason 
why  you  should  do  anything  to  keep  the  other  fellow 
from  enjoying  it — if  he  wants  to — //  you  are  being 
fooled  by  any  of  these  things:  Suppose  you  stop 
for  just  a  minute  and  read  the  following  statements: 

First: — You  know  that  the  standard  of  wages 
paid  in  the  shop  is  determined  not  by  that  high-grade 
worker  who  has  made  good  because  he  sacrificed  to 
win  out — but  very  largely  by  the  low-grade  man  who 
boozes  and  who  can  just  get  into  the  shop-door  be- 
cause workers  are  scarce.  Somewhere  between  the 
two  the  boss  strikes  an  average  wage  for  everybody 
else.  The  more  boozers  there  are,  the  lower  the 
rate  of  wages  paid  the  average  man,  even  if  he's 
sober — and  this  means  lower  wages  for  you  I 

Doesn't  this  affect  your  pocket-book? 

Second: — Life  insurance  men  know  that  making 


How  Much  Spent  for  Liquor?      49 

or  selling  or  drinking  booze  shortens  life.  There's 
scarcely  a  life  insurance  company  that  will  insure 
a,  bartender  or  a  brewery  worker  because  of  his 
occupation — and  life  insurance  companies  are  not 
in  the  anti-saloon  business.  But  they  have  only  one 
insurance  rate  for  ordinary  men — drinkers  and  non- 
drinkers,  and  they  compel  the  man  who  doesn't 
booze  to  make  up  for  the  extra  amount  that  the 
boozer  should  pay. 

Doesn't  this  affect  your  pocket-book? 

Third: — Store-keepers  know  that  men  who  spend 
too  much  of  their  money  for  booze  don't  pay  their 
bills — but  somebody  has  got  to  pay  them,  so  they 
simply  boost  the  original  price  of  the  goods  to  allow 
for  such  losses.  And  so  the  man  who  doesn't  booze 
helps  pay  the  bill  of  the  boozer. 

Doesn't  this  affect  your  pocket-book? 

Fourth: — Police  courts,  jails,  hospitals,  alms- 
houses,  insane  asylums  and  similar  institutions  are 
supported  by  your  taxes.  Fully  half  the  "business" 
of  these  institutions  comes  as  a  direct  result  of  the 
liquor  traffic. 

Doesn't  this  affect  your  pocket-book? 

Isn't  it  your  business  if  men  booze? 

You  can't  afford  to  be  too  generous  with  what  be- 
longs to  your  family.  Your  first  obligation  is  to 
them — not  to  the  man  who  thoughtlessly  lowers  the 
rate  of  wages,  increases  life  insurance  premiums, 
boosts  the  costs  of  the  necessities  of  life,  and  runs 
up  your  taxes — all  because  he  insists  that  saloons 


50  Why  Prohibition! 

shall  be  maintained  for  his  convenience — no  matter 
where  you  get  off. 

But  liquor  men  indignantly  deny  that  the  annual 
drink  bill  of  this  country  amounts  to  two  billion  dol- 
lars. They  point  to  the  figures  given  in  the  Statis- 
tical Abstract  of  the  United  States,  which,  they  say, 
show  the  value  of  the  products  in  the  liquor  business. 

But  this  is  merely  the  selling  value  of  the  product 
at  the  brewery  and  distillery — not  the  retail  price 
paid  by  the  ultimate  consumer.  And  it's  what  the 
consumer  pays  that  determines  the  amount  that  is 
spent  for  liquor, — not  what  the  saloonkeeper  pays. 

For  the  most  part,  the  average  man  drinks  beer 
and  whiskey  in  the  saloon — not  in  the  brewery  or 
distillery.  And  if  the  saloon  is  to  be  maintained, 
somebody  must  pay  for  its  support. 

Who  pays  this  bill?  The  man  in  front  of  the 
bar.  He  pays  for  the  rent,  the  fixtures,  the  licenses, 
the  wages  of  bartenders,  and  all  other  expenses  of 
maintaining  the  saloon,  besides  paying  for  the  cost 
of  the  liquor  itself. 

He  must  also  pay  for  the  support  of  all  the  so- 
called  "allied"  industries — the  industries  manufac- 
turing glassware,  barrels,  bar  fixtures,  etc.,  in  so 
far  as  their  products  are  used  in  the  manufacture 
and  sale  of  liquor.  For  if  he  doesn't,  who  does? 
There  are  no  benevolent  organisations  in  the  liquor 
business  which  support  saloonkeepers  and  others  en- 
gaged directly  or  indirectly  in  the  liquor  trade  who 
are  failures. 


How  Much  Spent  for  Liquor?      51 

But  let's  see  what  the  Yearbook  of  the  United 
States  Brewers'  Association  says  about  the  "financial 
loss"  if  the  saloon  is  destroyed. 

In  the  Yearbook  for  1914,  page  257,  we  are  in- 
formed that  among  uthe  sums  of  money  values« 
which  would  disappear  under  the  proposed  scheme 
of  national  Prohibition"  would  be  the  following: 

Annual  disbursements  for  wages    $453*872,553 

Annual  disbursements  other  than  for  wages    1,121,696,097 


$1,575,568,650 

If  over  $1,500,000,000  is  spent  annually  for 
wages,  materials,  etc.,  one  can  imagine  that  a  very 
considerable  sum  above  this  amount  must  be  added 
to  make  up  for  profits  and  other  "incidentals." 

For  example,  it  does  not  include  the  "local  license 
fees  paid  by  the  distillers  and  wine-makers,  nor  the 
amount  of  local  taxes  paid  upon  the  property  they 
occupy."  The  amount  shown  as  disbursements  by 
the  allied  manufactures  and  trades  "can  only  be  re- 
garded as  representing  a  part  of  the  sums  involved." 
The  amount  actually  given  is  nearly  forty  million 
dollars. 

There  are  many  other  items,  which,  it  is  claimed, 
have  not  been  included  in  this  estimate,  the  sum  of 
which  must  amount  to  many  millions  of  dollars. 

Neither  does  the  amount  of  wages  paid  actually 
include  the  total  expenditures  for  wages,  the  Year- 
book says.  Allowance  is  made  for  only  498,906 


52  Why  Prohibition! 

employes.  To  this  number  should  be  added  "thou- 
sands of  employes  selling  liquors  in  grocery  stores, 
hotels,  clubs,  etc."  It  is  estimated  that  500,000 
additional  employes  of  various  kinds  should  be  in- 
cluded, because  they  are  "indirectly  obtaining  their 
sustenance  from  the  liquor  industry." 

The  grand  total  for  all  these  employees  number 
1,000,000,  according  to  the  oft-repeated  statement 
of  the  liquor  men.  If  these  average  an  income  of 
$900  a  year,  this  item  alone  would  amount  to  $900,- 
000,000.  Only  about  one-half  of  this  sum  has  been 
accounted  for  in  the  Yearbook,  in  wages  paid. 

Let's  keep  in  mind  all  the  while  that  the  only  way 
whereby  this  sum  of  money  can  be  raised  is  through 
the  actual  cash  expended  by  the  consumers  for  intoxi- 
cating liquor.  There  is  no  other  source  from  which 
this  money  may  come. 

Remember,  also,  that  the  $1,575,568,650  mem- 
tioned  in  the  Brewer's  Yearbook,  and  those  other 
extra  expenditures  which  have  not  been  included, 
bring  us  merely  to  the  point  where  intoxicating 
liquor  is  ready  to  be  sold. 

Now  the  saloonkeeper  must  get  out  of  the  man 
across  the  bar  not  only  what  was  actually  spent  by 
the  brewers  and  distillers ;  not  only  what  he,  himself, 
has  expended  in  rent,  wages  and  other  incidentals; 
not  only  what  the  men  in  the  allied  trades  have 
spent  in  wages  and  for  raw  materials  and  other 
items,  but  the  man  across  the  bar  must  spend  enough 
money  to  pay  interest,  dividends  and  profits  on  all 


How  Much  Spent  for  Liquor?      53 

the  money  invested  in  the  liquor  business.  Without 
going  into  details,  it  may  be  said  that  in  order  to 
come  out  in  a  manner  satisfactory  to  the  liquor  men, 
upon  the  basis  of  these  figures,  it  would  be  necessary 
for  the  man  before  the  bar  to  spend  about  $4,000,- 
000,000  annually. 

Can  it  be  that  the  liquor  men  have  very  greatly 
overestimated  the  importance  and  extent  of  their 
business,  thus  inflating  the  figures  which  must  be 
arrived  at  in  determining  the  sum  which  the  people 
spend  for  liquor? 

The  liquor  men  can't  "get  us  both  coming  and 
going."  They'll  be  compelled  either  to  admit  that 
they  tried  to  fool  us  when  it  was  to  their  advantage 
to  boost  costs  and  expenditures,  or  else  they'll  have 
to  confess  that  our  drink  bill  is  greater  than  the 
wildest  figures  of  the  prohibitionists  would  indicate. 

They  pretend  to  be  greatly  elated  because  the  per 
capita  consumption  of  intoxicating  liquor  has  "stead- 
ily  increased"  in  spite  of  the  activities  of  the  various 
temperance  agencies  at  work  in  this  country. 

They  declare  that  the  anti-saloon  movement  is  a 
failure,  and  that  "dry  states"  and  "local  option" 
are  not  at  all  affecting  the  liquor  business. 

But  in  spite  of  their  claim  that  their  business  hasn't 
been  hard  hit  on  account  of  anti-saloon  agitation  and 
legislation — all  of  which  is  said  for  the  benefit  of 
the  public — the  liquor  men  know  that  they  have 
reached  the  beginning  of  the  end. 

Even  the  statistics  they  like  to  quote  prove  it. 


54 


Why  Prohibition! 


In  1850  the  per  capita  consumption  of  intoxicating 
liquor  was  about  4  gallons.  In  1913  it  was  nearly 
23  gallons — an  increase  of  about  600  per  cent. 

But — from  1870  to  1890  the  increase  in  the  per 
capita  consumption  of  liquor  was  only  about  100  per 
cent.,  and  during  the  20  years  following,  that  is,  from 
1890  to  1910,  the  increase  was  only  41  per  cent. 
From  1910  to  1914  the  increase  was  less  than  one- 
third  of  one  per  cent. 

Following  this  there  was  a  decided  slump  in  the 
use  of  liquor.  Here  are  the  figures  for  the  entire 
period  since  1850: 

Liquor  Consumed  in  the  United  States 
(From  the  Statistical  Abstract  of  the  United  States) 


Year 

Gallons 
Spirits 

Gallons                  Gallons 
Wines               Malt  Liquors 

Gallons.  Total    Gallons 
Consumption  Per  Capita 

1850 

51,833,473 

6,316,371           36,563,009 

94,712,853 

4.08 

1860 

89,968,651 

10,804,687         101,346,669 

202,120.007 

6-43 

1870 

79,895,708 

12,225,067         204,756,156 

296,876,931 

7.70 

1880 

63,526,694 

28,098,179         414,220,165 

505,845,038 

1  0.08 

1890 

87,829,623 

28,945,993         855,929,559 

972,705,175 

15-53 

1895 

78,655,063 

20,863,877 

,043,033,486 

1,142,552,426 

16.57 

1900 

97,356,864 

29,988,467 

,222,387,104 

1,349,732,435 

17-75 

1905 

120,869,649 

35,059,717 

,538,526,610 

1,694,455,976 

19.85 

1906 

127,851,583 

46,485,223 

,700,421,221 

1,874,758,027 

21.55 

1907 

140,084,436 

57,738,848 

,822,313,525 

2,020,136,809 

22.79 

1908 

I25,379,3H 

52,121,646 

,828,732,448 

2,006,233,408 

22.22 

1909 

121,130,036 

61,779,549 

,752,634,426 

i,935,544,on 

2  1.  06 

1910 

I33,I38,684 

60,548,078 

,851,666,658 

2,045,353,420 

22.19 

1911 

138,585,989 

63,859,232 

,966,911,754 

2,169,356,975 

22.79 

1912 

139,496,331 

56,424,711      1,932,531,184 

2,128,452,226 

21.98 

1913 

147,745,628 

55,327,461     2,030,347,372 

2,233,420,461 

22.68 

1914 

143,447,227 

52,418,430     2,056,407,108 

2,252,272,765 

22.50 

1915 

127,159,098 

32,911,909      1,855,524,284 

2,015,595,291 

19.80 

1916 

139,973,684 

47,587,145      1,818,275,042 

2,005,835,871 

19.40 

1917 

167,740,325 

1,884,265,377 

20.00* 

•Estimated. 


How  Much  Spent  for  Liquor?      55 

The  fluctuations  of  the  past  few  years  have  been 
due  to  many  unusual  causes — in  1914  came  the  "hard 
times"  and  the  following  year  the  consumption 
of  liquor  tumbled  over  ten  per  cent.  Then  came 
the  unprecedented  "good  times"  due  to  the  war, 
when  there  was  a  slight  increase  in  the  use  of  liquor. 
And  the  war  itself  has  produced  an  abnormal  situ- 
ation which  cannot  be  made  the  basis  of  a  fair  esti- 
mate. But  the  figures  shown  in  the  table  covering 
a  period  of  over  60  years  show  plainly  that  there 
has  steadily  been  a  comparative  decrease  in  the  use 
of  liquor  in  this  country. 

And  yet,  this  should  not  satisfy  those  who  are 
opposed  to  the  liquor  traffic.  The  war  has  enor- 
mously increased  the  cost  of  government;  the  whole 
nation  is  devoting  itself  to  meeting  the  new  demands 
made  upon  it.  We  are  all  practising  economy,  but 
what  are  we  doing  about  that  two  billion  dollar 
drink  bill? 

Why  not  cut  it  out  entirely  and  spend  the  money 
for  other  things  that  will  increase  our  happiness 
and  our  efficiency  as  a  nation  and  enlarge  our  chances 
for  winning  the  war?  Drink  decreases  happiness, 
makes  us  less  efficient  and  multiplies  our  chances  of 
losing  the  war. 

No  one  can  say  one  strong  unqualified  word  for 
the  liquor  habit,  or  the  liquor  business. 


Lost  Jobs  When  Saloons  are  Closed 

A  GOOD  many  policemen  will  lose  their  jobs. 

So  will  some  jail  keepers. 

Some  judges  will  not  be  so  busy. 

But  this  will  be  so  because  men  who  now  drink 
will  be  more  profitably  employed.  They  will,  there- 
fore, keep  out  of  the  kind  of  trouble  which  usually 
lands  a  man  first,  into  the  hands  of  a  policeman; 
second,  into  the  hands  of  a  judge;  and  third,  into 
the  hands  of  a  jail  keeper. 

Policemen,  judges  and  jail  keepers  will  be  more 
profitably  employed  than  they  were  when  they 
"punished'*  booze-soaked  men. 

Lawyers  will  not  have  so  many  cases  of  certain 
kinds  which  grow  out  of  the  liquor  business,  directly 
and  indirectly. 

Doctors  will  not  be  called  upon  so  frequently  by 
those  who  now  suffer  because  the  saloons  are  wide 
open. 

There  are  others  who  may  lose  their  jobs — many 
of  whose  occupations  are  in  themselves  legitimate 
enough,  but  whose  time  is  taken  up  with  handling 
the  wrecks  of  the  liquor  business,  and  dealing  with 

56 


Lost  Jobs  When  Saloons  Close     57V 

those  who  are  suffering  in  other  ways  on  account  of  it. 

But  who  will  not  glory  in  this  loss  of  employment? 

The  man  who  heretofore  has  been  a  victim  of 
drink  will  be  glad. 

So  will  his  wife  and  children. 

So  will  those  who  have  been  paying  big  taxes 
as  a  result  of  the  saloon's  influence. 

Policemen,  and  judges,  and  jail  keepers,  and  law- 
yers, and  doctors,  and  hospital  attendants,  and  all 
others  who  are  engaged  in  occupations  whose  basis 
is  ethical  and  humanity-serving,  will  be  glad  when 
the  saloon  has  ceased  to  damage  men  and  women. 

But  what  about  workingmen  in  general? 

The  average  workingman  fears  being  out  of  work 
more  than  he  does  going  to  hell. 

The  liquor  interests  have  capitalised  upon  this 
fear  and  by  presenting  an  array  of  figures  which 
seem  to  prove  that  a  calamity  will  follow  the  abo- 
lition of  the  liquor  traffic  they  have  persuaded  large 
numbers  of  workingmen  who  never  enter  a  saloon 
to  vote  for  its  retention. 

For  a  long  time  the  liquor  men  have  been  de- 
claring that  if  their  business  were  destroyed,  it  would 
throw  one  million  workingmen  onto  the  labour  mar- 
ket, thus  creating  "a  labor  panic." 

The  argument  of  the  liquor  men  that  a  calamity 
will  follow  the  abolition  of  the  liquor  traffic  is  based 
entirely  upon  the  absurdity  that  if  we  no  longer 
spend  two  billion  dollars  for  liquor,  we  can  by  no 
possibility  spend  it  for  anything  else. 


58  Why  Prohibition! 

They  reason  that  if  a  man  doesn't  spend  his 
week's  wages  for  beer  or  whiskey,  the  only  thing 
he  can  do  with  his  wages  is  to  throw  them  into  the 
sewer.  The  fact  is,  he  will  spend  his  wages  for 
food  and  clothing  and  furniture  and  other  necessi- 
ties of  life  creating  work  and  wages  and  increased 
business  for  all  kinds  of  legitimate  industries.  Count- 
ing all  classes  of  industries,  the  transfer  of  money 
from  the  liquor  business  to  these  industries  would, 
roughly,  give  work  to  four  times  as  many  wage- 
earners,  who  collectively  would  receive  four  times 
as  much  in  the  form  of  wages,  and  four  times  as 
much  raw  materials  would  be  required. 

How  can  more  wage-earners  employed,  more 
wages  paid,  and  more  raw  materials  required  create 
a  labour  panic? 

Here  are  some  figures  showing  the  relative  im- 
portance of  the  liquor  industry  as  compared  with 
all  other  industries,  the  figures  being  taken  from 
the  Statistical  Abstract  of  the  United  States : 

All  Industries  Liquor  Industry 

Wage-earners  (number) . . .  6,616,046  62,920 

Wages  paid $3,427,038,000       $45,252,000 

Cost  of  materials $12,141,791,000     $139,199,000 

Capital  invested $18,428,270,000    $771,516,000 

It  will  be  noted  that  the  liquor  industry  employs 
only  about  one  per  cent,  of  the  workers  in  the  manu- 
facturing industries. 

The  Statistical  Abstract  indicates  that  for  every 


Lost  Jobs  When  Saloons  Close     59 

one  million  dollars  invested  in  six  principal  indus- 
tries the  following  number  of  wage-earners  are  em- 
ployed: Liquor,  77;  iron,  284;  paper  and  printing, 
369;  leather,  469;  textiles,  574;  lumber,  579. 

The  iron  industry  employs  nearly  four  times  as 
many  workers  for  every  million  dollars  invested  as 
does  the  liquor  industry;  the  paper  industry  five 
times  as  many;  the  leather  industry  six  times  as 
many;  the  textile  industry  seven  and  one-half  times 
as  many,  and  the  lumber  industry  seven  and  one-half 
times  as  many. 

The  ratio  of  wages  paid  to  capital  invested  in  this 
group  of  industries  is  as  follows:  Liquor,  5.6  per 
cent.;  iron,  17.6  per  cent.;  paper  and  printing,  21.3 
per  cent.;  leather,  23.5  per  cent.;  textiles,  23.9  per 
cent.;  lumber,  27.1  per  cent. 

The  figures  given  by  the  liquor  men  as  to  how 
many  wage-earners  will  actually  lose  their  jobs  are 
greatly  exaggerated.  It  has  been  pointed  out  that 
the  liquor  industry  employed  only  62,920  wage- 
earners — according  to  the  last  census. 

But  of  these  62,920  less  than  one-fourth  were 
brewers,  maltsters,  distillers  and  rectifiers. 

More  teamsters  than  brewers  were  employed  by 
breweries. 

Of  these  62,920  wage-earners  employed  in  the 
manufacture  of  liquor,  fully  three-fourths  were  en- 
gaged in  occupations  which  are  not  at  all  peculiar 
to  the  production  of  liquor.  There  were  7,000  hot- 


60  Why  Prohibition! 

tiers,  15,000  labourers  and  nearly  3,000  stationary 
engineers. 

The  remainder  were  blacksmiths,  carpenters, 
coopers,  electricians,  machinists,  painters,  plumbers, 
firemen  and  other  mechanics. 

The  plea  is  being  made  that  all  the  men  who 
would  lose  their  jobs  when  breweries  and  distil- 
leries are  closed  would  be  compelled  to  learn  other 
trades. 

Would  a  teamster  drive  a  horse  any  differently 
because  his  truck  is  loaded  with  groceries,  instead  of 
booze? 

Does  an  engineer  run  his  engine  in  a  special  way 
simply  because  it  is  furnishing  power  to  a  shoe  fac- 
tory instead  of  a  brewery? 

Does  a  machinist  push  his  file  in  a  select  fashion 
for  a  distillery,  or  does  a  carpenter  use  a  saw  with 
special  adroitness  when  he  cuts  a  board  for  the 
booze  factory? 

Any  of  these  mechanics  would  feel  just  as  much 
at  home  on  any  other  kind  of  a  job  in  which  their 
services  were  required  as  skilled  workmen,  as  they 
would  in  a  brewery  or  a  distillery. 

The  only  wage-earners  who  would  be  compelled 
to  change  their  jobs  are  the  15,000  or  so  brewers, 
maltsters,  distillers  and  rectifiers. 

According  to  the  Census  figures,  10,000  mechanics 
of  various  kinds  are  compelled  every  year  to  shift 
from  one  occupation  to  another  on  account  of 


Lost  Jobs  When  Saloons  Close      61 

changes  in  industrial  operations,  or  because  of  the 
invention  of  labour-saving  machinery. 

Many  of  these  are  compelled  to  learn  entirely 
new  trades,  but  this  has  never  created  a  labour  panic 
— it  produced  scarcely  a  ripple. 

The  shifting  of  the  mechanics  now  employed  in 
breweries  would  never  create  a  labour  panic  at  a  time 
like  this,  when  it  is  most  difficult  to  secure  enough 
workingmen  in  our  great  industrial  plants. 

At  present  there  are  a  greater  number  of  persons 
who  are  suffering  very  much  more  because  these  men 
are  permitted  to  engage  in  the  liquor  business,  than 
these  workingmen  themselves  would  suffer  were  they 
compelled  to  engage  in  other  occupations. 

The  question  is,  shall  all  the  people  continue  to 
suffer  on  account  of  the  ravages  of  the  liquor  traffic 
in  order  to  keep  this  very  small  percentage  of  men 
employed  on  their  present  jobs,  or  shall  we  insist 
that  they  enter  other  occupations  in  which  they  shall 
become  a  blessing  to  society  instead  of  a  curse,  even 
though  they  are  compelled  to  make  this  change  at  a 
personal  sacrifice. 

But  what  about  the  bartenders — what  will  become 
of  them  when  the  saloons  are  closed? 

There  are  100,000  bartenders  in  the  United 
States — at  least  that's  what  Uncle  Sam  tells  us. 

What  makes  a  man  a  successful  bartender?  It's 
the  fact  that  he's  a  good  salesman,  a  good  mixer; 
he  knows  how  to  deal  with  men,  and  the  man  who 


62  Why  Prohibition! 

is  a  success  as  a  bartender,  will  be  a  success  as  a 
salesman  in  almost  any  other  kind  of  store. 

The  fact  is,  it  requires  many  more  people  to  sell 
two  billion  dollars  worth  of  bread  and  clothing,  for 
example,  than  it  does  to  sell  two  billion  dollars  worth 
of  booze. 

Furthermore,  most  bartenders  had  some  other 
kind  of  a  job  before  they  became  bartenders. 

A  man  doesn't  become  a  bartender  until  he  is 
nearly  twenty  or  more — before  that  time  he  worked 
as  a  mechanic,  or  as  a  salesman,  or  he  was  engaged 
in  some  other  occupation  to  which  he  may  return — i 
provided  he  hasn't  been  shot  all  to  pieces  on  account 
of  the  booze  business. 

Here's  a  quotation  that  tells  the  story : 

"The  closing  of  the  saloon  merely  forces  the  bartender  to 
change  from  a  bad  job  to  a  good  job — from  a  job  in  which 
he  hurts  his  fellow  men,  to  a  job  in  which  he  helps  his 
fellow  men. 

"When  a  bartender  puts  a  man  out  of  a  job,  he  disgraces 
the  man,  disgraces  his  family  and  makes  him  unfit  for  an- 
other job. 

"When  No-License  puts  a  bartender  out  of  a  job,  he  be- 
comes a  more  honourable  citizen,  his  family  becomes  more 
honourable,  and  the  community  secures  a  wealth-producing 
workman,  instead  of  a  wealth-destroying  workman. 

"It  is  better — far  better — that  the  bartender  should  lose 
his  job  and  become  fitted  for  a  better  one,  than  that  scores 
of  his  patrons  should  lose  their  jobs  and  be  unfitted  for  any 
job." 


Lost  Jobs  When  Saloons  Close      63 

A  member  of  the  Bartenders'  Union  recently 
wrote  an  article  on  "How  to  Be  a  Bartender,"  for 
the  Mixer  and  Server,  the  official  journal  of  his 
union.  He  said  that  several  books  have  been  pub- 
lished on  "How  to  Mix  Fancy  Drinks,"  but  in  his 
fourteen  years*  experience  as  a  bartender  he  had 
never  yet  seen  a  book  on  "How  to  Be  a  Bartender." 

Evidently  this  bartender  believes  that  the  ability 
to  mix  fancy  drinks  isn't  the  most  important  part 
of  a  bartender's  job.  Here  are  some  of  the  things 
which  he  calls  essential  if  the  bartender  is  to  be  suc- 
cessful : 

"First: — He  must  be  immaculately  clean,  both  so 
far  as  his  linen  is  concerned  and  also  as  to  his  per- 
son *  *  *  The  old  maxim  that  'cleanliness  is  next 
to  godliness'  is  certainly  true  in  the  case  of  the  bar- 
tender. It  is  one  of  his  principal  assets  in  applying 
for  and  holding  a  job. 

"Second: — Next  to  cleanliness  comes  good  com- 
mon sense.  The  bartender  must  be  able  to  size  up 
any  situation  clearly  at  a  glance.  He  sizes  up  the 
customer,  the  place  he  works  in,  its  possibilities,  the 
improvements  he  would  make,  and  so  on;  and  if  he 
is  interested  in  the  success  of  the  business  he  can 
find  abundant  time  to  make  suggestions  to  his  em- 
ployer that  may  be  appreciated. 

"Third:. — The  bartender  should  upon  securing  a 
position,  learn  where  every  cordial  and  bottle  is  to 
be  found;  look  the  cigars  carefully  over,  so  that  he 


64  Why  Prohibition! 

can  pick  out  any  brand  of  cigar  in  the  case  or  bottle 
of  liquor  without  hesitation. 

"Fourth: — He  must  not  'butt  into'  the  conver- 
sation of  his  customer.  He  should  always  remember 
that  it  is  the  customer  who  is  spending  the  money, 
and  the  employer  wants  the  customer,  and  cares 
nothing  for  the  opinions  of  the  'man  behind'  in  poli- 
tics or  anything  else. 

"Fifth: — He  must  be  polite,  answering  all  ques- 
tions to  the  best  of  his  ability.  He  should  thor- 
oughly learn  the  city  in  which  he  is  employed  in  order 
to  properly  direct  strangers,  many  of  whom  drop 
into  saloons  for  information  rather  than  ask  a 
stranger  on  the  street.  In  short  the  successful  bar- 
tender must  be  a  general  information  bureau,  a  doc- 
tor, lawyer  and  several  other  things  too  numerous 
to  mention,  not  required  by  any  other  man  in  any 
walk  of  life.  All  of  which  requires  time  and  study 
to  make  him  proficient." 

Imagine  a  man  with  these  qualifications  really 
looking  for  a  job  after  the  saloons  are  put  out  of 
business!  Any  man  who  can  fulfil  these  require- 
ments would  make  a  successful  salesman  in  many 
another  kind  of  business. 

So  don't  let's  worry  about  the  bartender  who  "will 
lose  his  job  when  the  saloons  are  closed."  Taking 
their  chances  with  other  salesmen  they  will  easily 
hold  their  own. 

The  Bartenders'  Union  is  probably  the  only  la- 


Lost  Jobs  When  Saloons  Close      65 

hour  organization  which  regularly  opens  and  closes 
its  meetings  with  prayer. 

At  the  opening  of  the  meeting  the  President  gives 
three  raps,  bringing  the  members  to  their  feet.  "Let 
us  be  silent  while  the  chaplain  invokes  the  Father's 
aid,"  orders  the  presiding  officer.  And  here  is  the 
prayer  that  is  offered: 

"Be  with  us,  our  Father,  in  this  our  Convention.  Grant 
us,  we  pray  thee,  a  part  of  Thy  wisdom,  that  we  may  pur- 
sue the  path  which  causes  all  men  to  acknowledge  the 
brotherhood  of  men  and  Fatherhood  of  Thee." 

At  the  close  of  the  meeting  the  president  says: 
"Let  us  be  silent  while  the  chaplain  delivers  thanks 
to  the  Father."  And  the  chaplain  prays : 

"Thou,  O  Father,  who  has  created  all  things  as  they  are, 
now  that  we  are  about  to  quit  this  circle  and  mingle  again 
with  the  selfish  world,  we  pray  Thee  to  protect  and  shield 
us  and  our  work  from  evil  hands,  and  may  we  all  at  last 
be  received  into  the  circle  of  Thy  love.  Amen." 

There  would  be  reason  for  rejoicing  if  these 
workers  were  to  pray  for  a  worthier  cause — some 
day  they  will  do  so,  and  they  will  be  glad  of  the 
chance. 

Meanwhile,  from  whom  do  they  ask  God  to  pro- 
tect them  and  shield  them?  Whose  are  the  "evil 
hands"  from  which  their  work  is  to  be  delivered? 

— We  think  of  little  children  whose  lives  have 


66  Why  Prohibition! 

been  blasted  because  bartenders  furnished  their 
fathers  with  strong  drink. 

— We  think  of  the  wives  whose  hopes  and  dreams 
have  been  shattered  because  the  men  who  offer  this 
prayer  helped  to  ruin  the  husbands  whom  they  once 
honoured. 

— We  think  of  the  men  and  women  who  have 
been  reduced  to  beggary,  whose  lives  have  been 
broken,  who  have  been  sent  to  prisons  and  asylums, 
who  are  wrecks  of  their  former  selves — they  who 
in  anguish  are  crying  out  "Deliver  us  from  tempta- 
tion!" to  the  same  God  to  whom  the  bartenders  are 
appealing,  "Shield  us  and  our  work  from  evil 
hands!" 

As  between  the  Bartenders'  Union,  which  regu- 
larly petitions  the  Almighty  to  help  protect  the  sa- 
loon business,  and  the  forces  which  are  characterised 
as  "evil  hands,"  whose  efforts  are  directed  toward 
the  abolition  of  the  liquor  business,  there  can  be  no 
doubt  as  to  whose  prayer  God  will  finally  answer ! 

But  lost  jobs  are  not  the  only  consideration. 

More  than  half  the  world  is  engaged  in  the  blood- 
iest war  in  all  history — and  because  of  it  every  mafe 
has  a  job,  probably  at  the  highest  wages  that  he 
ever  received. 

Wouldn't  it  be  a  shame  to  stop  this  war  and  thus 
throw  out  of  work  a  large  number  of  mechanics? 

What  though  the  lives  of  millions  of  men  are 
sacrificed  and  countless  widows  and  orphans  remain 
to  suffer.  Who  cares  whether  cities  are  destroyed 


Lost  Jobs  JVhen  Saloons  Close     67 

and  treasures  ruinecj — let  the  war  go  on,  for  if  you 
stop  it,  you  may  create  a  labour  panic  1 

We  are  told  there  are  500,000  prostitutes  In  the 
United  States — more  people  than  are  employed  in 
the  wholesale  and  retail  liquor  business  as  well  as 
in  the  manufacture  of  liquor. 

These  500,000  women  furnish  an  enormous 
amount  of  work  of  all  kinds  for  mechanics  and 
storekeepers.  They  require  a  large  number  of 
buildings ;  they  buy  a  great  deal  of  household  furni- 
ture; thousands  of  dressmakers  are  given  employ- 
ment; jewelers  are  kept  busy;  chauffeurs  and  drug- 
gists are  supported  and  an  endless  number  of  men 
and  women  are  employed  as  electricians,  bartenders, 
chambermaids,  housekeepers,  messenger  boys,  wait- 
ers and  musicians — and  these  honest  working  people 
help  make  this  business  a  success. 

If  we  destroy  the  white  slave  traffic,  we  would 
take  away  the  jobs  of  all  these  workers.  Shall  we, 
therefore,  continue  to  encourage  the  white  slave 
traffic? 

What  does  it  matter  whether  our  daughters  are 

sacrificed — and  whether  our  sons  are  forever  ruined 

—the  main  thing  is  that  these  working  people  who 

are  now  supported  by  the  white  slave  traffic  should 

not  lose  their  jobs. 

Same  way  with  the  booze  business.  Everybody 
knows  its  effect  upon  those  who  are  engaged  in  it 
and  upon  those  who  use  its  product — we  know  that 
it  has  sacrificed  more  lives  than  have  been  lost  in  all 


68  Why  Prohibition! 

the  wars  since  the  world  began — but  in  the  minds 
of  a  very  considerable  number  of  people  the  only 
consideration  is  this — how  many  men  will  lose  their 
jobs  if  the  booze  business  is  abolished? 

Nothing  else  seems  to  count.  What  if  countless 
thousands  go  to  jail  and  hundreds  are  sent  to  the 
death-chair  because  of  the  liquor  business — what  if 
millions  of  lives  are  lost  in  every  generation — let  the 
traffic  in  alcohol  go  on ! 

Have  we  gone  mad?  Isn't  there  anything  else 
that  one  must  consider  besides  the  purely  commer- 
cial aspects  of  this  business?  Do  the  bodies  and 
the  souls  of  our  loved  ones  count  for  nothing? 

Isn't  it  time  that  we  came  to  our  senses  and  for- 
ever destroyed  the  liquor  business? 

But  what  about  the  farmer's  job?  The  liquor 
men  say  that  he  will  be  "hard  hit"  if  Prohibition 
prevails. 

Let's  review  a  few  broad  facts  as  to  what  will 
happen  to  the  farmer  when  the  booze  business  is 
destroyed. 

There  are  10,000,000  farmers  in  the  United 
States.  Their  product  is  worth  about  $10,000,000,- 
ooo;  that  is,  $1,000  worth  for  each  farmer. 

The  liquor  men  purchase  from  the  farmers  about 
$100,000,000  worth  of  their  products — or  just 
about  $10  worth  from  each  farmer. 

Of  course,  prices  of  food  products  vary  greatly — 
but  the  figures  given  may  be  counted  a  fair  average. 
In  general  it  may  be  said  that  the  liquor  men  pur- 


Lost  Jobs  When  Saloons  Close      69 

chase  about  one  per  cent,  of  the  farmer's  product — 
and  according  to  our  statistics  this  one  per  cent, 
amounts  to  $10  per  year  for  each  farmer. 

Now  then — what  will  happen  to  the  farmer  when 
the  liquor  men  no  longer  purchase  each  year  $10 
worth  of  his  produce? 

Well — let's  consider  another  item  : 

There  are  100,000,000  people  in  the  United 
States.  The  liquor  men  purchase  $100,000,000 
worth  of  the  farmers'  produce,  or  just  about  one  dol- 
lar's worth  for  each  person  in  this  country. 

If  each  person  were  to  increase  his  expenditure 
for  apples,  peaches,  cherries,  grain  or  any  other 
product  of  the  farmer,  by  just  the  price  of  a  two  cent 
postage  stamp  per  week,  the  farmer  would  sell  to 
all  the  people  as  much  as  he  now  sells  to  the  liquor 
men. 

And  with  the  better  standards  of  living  for  all 
people  after  the  booze  business  is  abolished,  can 
there  be  any  doubt  that  each  person's  purchasing 
power  will  be  increased  two  cents  per  week? 

It's  a  wise  farmer  who  can  read  the  signs  of  the 
times.  Practically  every  farmer  is  a  fair  weather 
prophet — the  skies  and  the  winds  speak  to  him  and 
he  is  alert  to  their  warnings. 

Just  now  all  the  signs  point  toward  the  abolition 
of  the  liquor  business.  And  while  men  will  stop 
using  the  farmers'  produce  in  the  form  of  booze, 
they  cannot  stop  using  it  in  the  form  of  food.  Men 
may  cease  drinking  intoxicants,  but  they  will  not 


yo  Why  Prohibition! 

cease  eating  cereals.  Furthermore,  the  less  they 
drink,  the  more  they  will  eat. 

The  farmer  who  may  now  be  supplying  the  booze 
business  with  his  produce  will  furnish  it  to  the  food 
purveyor. 

And  there  will  be  more  satisfaction  in  this  use 
of  the  farmers'  produce — both  to  the  farmer  and  the 
consumer.  The  farmer  will  be  free  from  the  con- 
demnation of  having  helped  to  damn  the  maker, 
the  seller  and  the  user  of  booze,  and  the  consumer 
will  be  free  from  the  curse  of  the  liquor  traffic  and 
from  the  inevitable  penalty  of  drinking  booze. 

At  any  rate,  the  only  point  we  wish  to  make  just 
now  is,  that  if  the  liquor  men  do  not  buy  produce 
from  the  farmer  it  isn't  at  all  likely  that  the  farmer 
will  suffer.  He  will  buy  just  as  many  automobiles, 
just  as  much  improved  machinery,  just  as  many 
magazines  and  all  other  things  which  are  enriching 
the  lives  of  the  farmer  and  his  family. 

And  the  farmer  isn't  worrying  about  prohibition 
in  the  least.  He's  helping  it  along  in  every  way  that 
he  can.  The  white  spaces  on  prohibition  maps  prove 
it! 


Personal  Liberty  and  Prohibition 

THE  doctrine  of  "personal  liberty"  as  applied  to 
the  use  of  liquor  has  been  over-worked  by  the  liquor 
men.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  there  is  no  such  thing  as 
an  absolute  individual  right  to  do  any  particular 
thing,  or  to  eat  or  drink  any  particular  thing,  or  to 
enjoy  the  association  of  one's  own  family,  or  even 
to  live,  if  that  thing  is  in  conflict  with  "the  law  of 
public  necessity." 

If  a  member  of  your  family  becomes  ill  with  a 
highly  contagious  disease  he  is  quarantined — no  one 
is  allowed  to  visit  him  excepting  those  who  minister 
to  his  needs. 

When  a  great  fire  breaks  out  in  a  congested 
district,  buildings  surrounding  the  fire  are  blown 
up  in  order  to  prevent  the  further  spread  of  the 
fire. 

These  measures  are  resorted  to  for  the  common 
good. 

We  are  told  by  the  liquor  men  that  the  State  has 
no  right  to  tell  you  whom  you  shall  marry.  But 
suppose  you,  a  white  man,  were  to  select  a  Negro 
woman — or  suppose  you,  a  Negro,  were  to  select 

7i 


72  Why  Prohibition! 

a  white  woman.  What  do  you  suppose  would  hap- 
pen in  some  States? 

Suppose  you  were  to  select  as  your  wife  an  imbe- 
cile or  a  lunatic?  Legislation  on  this  point  isn't 
quite  so  far  along  as  it  might  be,  but  there's  no  doubt 
that  soon  there  will  be  complete  prohibition  in  this  re- 
spect, in  order  to  help  wipe  out  imbecility  and  lunacy. 

You  can't  marry  your  cousin  in  some  States;  you 
can't  marry  your  sister  in  any  State,  and  you  will 
find  it  difficult  to  marry  a  divorced  woman  under 
some  circumstances. 

Furthermore,  if  the  present  tendency  in  the  matter 
of  eugenics  is  continued,  you'll  have  to  be  a  fairly 
perfect  human  specimen  if  you  wish  to  marry  any 
woman. 

You'll  have  to  be  free  from  disease  and  some 
other  handicaps  which  might  result  in  the  increase 
of  disease,  before  you  can  get  a  marriage  license. 

This  will  often  prove  to  be  a  real  hardship,  and 
there's  a  danger  of  carrying  the  application  of  the 
laws  of  eugenics  too  far,  but  in  all  this  prohibition 
there's  just  one  consideration — the  welfare  of  so- 
ciety as  a  whole. 

It  is  insisted  that  the  physical  and  moral  weak- 
nesses of  mankind  must  not  be  perpetuated  through 
the  children  born  of  defective  parents.  The  State 
declares  that  it  must  protect  itself  against  such  mis- 
fortune, no  matter  how  much  some  individuals  may 
suffer. 

It  is  quite  apparent  that  as  civilisation  advances 


Personal  Liberty  and  Prohibition      73 

society  or  the  state  will  lay  heavier  obligations  upon 
all  individuals  composing  the  state,  even  to  the  point 
of  the  sacrifice  of  one's  most  precious  "personal  lib- 
erty." For  it  is  only  thus  that  society  itself  can 
serve  all  individuals,  giving  each  a  larger  measure 
of  life  and  happiness. 

To  prevent  the  spread  of  disease,  the  state  has 
decreed  that  no  longer  shall  a  common  drinking  cup 
be  used,  and  the  common  towel  in  the  hotel  wash- 
room is  being  abolished. 

We  are  told  that  the  law  has  no  right  to  dictate 
what  a  man  shall  wear.  But  suppose  you  were  to 
dress  in  your  wife's  clothes? 

Suppose  you  tried  to  shoot  game  in  your  own 
woods,  or  fish  for  trout  in  your  own  private  stream 
when  the  law  forbids  you  to  do  so.  Suppose  you 
try  to  smoke  in  your  own  factory,  or  to  run  your 
automobile  wherever  and  however  you  please.  In 
all  these  things  men  are  being  restricted  for  the  good 
of  society  as  a  whole. 

Liquor  men  tell  us  that  one  man  has  as  much  right 
to  drink  a  glass  of  whiskey  as  another  has  to  drink 
a  cup  of  tea,  but  you  never  heard  of  one  man  kill- 
ing another  while  he  was  under  the  influence  of  tea, 
and  this  fact  does  have  something  to  do  with  the 
question  of  what  a  man  has  a  right  to  drink. 

You  are  not  permitted  to  spend  your  wages  as 
you  please  if  you  have  a  family  to  support — you  must 
first  provide  for  your  family. 

You  are  not  permitted  to  keep  your  back  yard  or 


74  Why  Prohibition! 

your  kitchen  or  your  cellar  in  a  bad  sanitary  con- 
dition, because  by  so  doing  you  would  endanger  the 
lives  and  health  of  your  neighbours. 

You  are  not  permitted  to  keep  your  children  out 
of  school,  even  though  you  yourself  do  not  be- 
lieve in  education,  because  these  children  also  be- 
long to  the  State  and  it  is  the  wish  of  the  State  to 
make  them  good  citizens,  so  it  insists  upon  com- 
pulsory education. 

You  are  not  permitted  to  use  habit-forming  drugs, 
because,  among  other  reasons,  if  you  do  so,  you  may 
make  yourself  a  burden  to  the  State. 

A  noted  defender  of  the  saloon  recently  said  "the 
State  trusts  you  with  the  liberty  to  kill,  society  trusts 
you  with  the  liberty  to  steal,  the  State  trusts  you  with 
the  liberty  to  murder." 

Now  if  he  had  added  "and  liquor  furnishes  you 
with  the  inclination,"  he  would  at  least  have  put  some 
truth  into  the  entire  statement. 

But  let's  see — 

"The  State  trusts  you  with  the  liberty  to  kill-;- 
society  trusts  you  with  the  liberty  to  steal."  Since 
when  ?  Doesn't  society  distinctly  prohibit  killing  and 
stealing?  Doesn't  it  organise  a  police  force  to  pre- 
vent men  from  killing  and  stealing? 

Let  this  illustrious  preacher  of  personal  liberty 
try  to  kill  or  steal  in  the  presence  of  a  big  six  foot 
policeman  and  he'll  find  out  what  becomes  of  his 
grandiloquent  statement  that  society  trusts  him  with 
the  liberty  to  kill  and  to  steal. 


Personal  Liberty  and  Prohibition      75 

He'll  have  his  face  punched  and  his  head  clubbed 
and  he'll  find  himself  landed  in  jail — if  he  insists 
upon  exercising  his  personal  liberty — and  he'll  re- 
main there  because  he  has  proven  that  he  is  a  dan- 
gerous citizen — too  dangerous  to  exercise  the  per- 
sonal liberty  of  which  he  boasts.  No; — God  and  so- 
ciety say  very  plainly  regarding  these  and  other  mat- 
ters— "Thou  shalt  not" — and  this  is  plain  prohibi- 
tion. 

As  far  as  possible  every  reasonable  measure  is 
taken  to  prevent  men  from  committing  crime,  and 
when  they  disobey  the  very  reasonable  laws  which 
are  framed  for  the  safeguarding  of  men  as  a  whole, 
they  are  punished  by  both  God  and  society. 

There  was  a  time  when  men  honestly  believed 
that  they  had  a  right  to  own  slaves — because  they 
thought  it  was  purely  a  question  of  property  rights — <. 
but  to-day  we  know  it  is  also  a  moral  question. 

There  was  a  time  when  men  honestly  believed  that 
all  they  needed  to  do  to  get  a  wife  was  to  take  a 
club  and  hit  the  woman  of  their  choice  on  the  head 
and  drag  her  home,  but  to-day — well,  women  have 
something  to  say  about  it,  too. 

There  was  a  time  when  men  honestly  believed  that 
they  had  an  absolute  right  to  do  with  their  chil- 
dren as  they  pleased,  but  to-day  they  recognise  the 
fact  that  children  have  rights  of  their  own. 

Slaves,  women,  children — these  have  come  to  their 
own  because  a  new  conception  of  rights  and  duties 
has  dawned  upon  men.  They  discovered  that  there 


76  Why  Prohibition! 

is  a  more  fundamental  question  than  property  rights 
— that  duty  is  a  bigger  word  than  rights. 

And  so  the  weaker  members  of  society  are  to-day 
being  given  a  better  chance. 

But  we  still  hark  back  to  the  property  rights  period 
and  the  question  of  personal  liberty  when  we  discuss 
the  saloon  and  the  liquor  business.  We  forget  that 
the  biggest  thing  in  this  discussion  is  duty  and  sac- 
rifice— for  the  sake  of  the  weaker  members  of  so- 
ciety— and  we  should  be  ready  to  give  up  our  rights 
when  the  well-being  of  mankind  as  a  whole  is 
concerned. 

The  man  who  is  ready  to  do  this  proves  that  he 
is  a  big  man — the  little  man  always  stands  out  for 
his  rights  no  matter  what  happens. 

"Prohibition  is  based  upon  the  idea  that  you  can 
take  away  one  man's  liberty  because  of  another 
man's  act.  The  Drys  want  to  run  society  on  the 
principle  of  an  insane  asylum.  Is  that  sound? 
They  find  a  sick  man  and  they  want  to  compel  every- 
body to  take  medicine.  They  find  a  man  with  a 
crutch  and  they  try  to  compel  every  man  to  carry 'a 
crutch  all  his  life,"  recently  said  one  of  the  chief 
exponents  of  the  liquor  business. 

He's  wrong.  The  "Drys"  do  not  want  to  run 
society  on  the  principle  of  an  insane  asylum;  they 
are  so  dead  set  against  insane  asylums  that  they  don't 
want  anybody  to  go  there — particularly  on  account 
of  the  influence  of  liquor;  and  they  don't  want  to 
compel  everybody  to  take  medicine — they  want  tp 


Personal  Liberty  and  Prohibition      77 

eliminate  the  cause  of  disease  so  that  nobody  will 
have  to  take  medicine. 

They  don't  want  to  compel  every  man  to  carry  a 
crutch  all  his  life — they  want  to  abolish  the  evil 
which  compels  men  to  walk  on  crutches.  They  don't 
want  to  take  away  anybody's  liberty,  because,  as 
Blackstone  says,  "Laws  when  prudently  framed  are 
by  no  means  subversive  but  rather  introductive  of 
liberty." 

Recently  a  great  steel  corporation  employing 
about  ten  thousand  workers  made  application  to  the 
Industrial  Commission  of  the  State  for  exemption 
from  the  law  requiring  that  every  worker  have  one 
day's  rest  in  seven.  One  of  the  chief  reasons  for 
making  this  request,  the  representative  of  the  steel 
company  said,  was  because  the  men  themselves 
wanted  to  work  seven  days  per  week,  twelve  hours 
per  day. 

It  is  always  possible  to  secure  signatures  protest- 
ing against  reforms  even  from  those  who  would  be 
most  directly  benefited  by  them.  During  the  Civil 
War  ten  thousand  slaves  signed  a  petition  protest- 
ing against  freedom;  they  said  they  preferred  to  re- 
main slaves.  Hundreds  of  little  children  in  the  cot- 
ton mills  have  asked  that  they  might  be  permitted 
to  remain  in  these  mills  and  that  they  were  not  in 
favour  of  Child  Labor  Laws.  The  same  thing  has 
been  true  of  boys  in  the  coal  breakers,  and  women 
in  the  canning  industry  who  wanted  to  work  sixteen 
hours  per  day.  It  often  happens  that  workingmen 


j8  Why  Prohibition! 

fail  to  appreciate  the  benefits  which  come  to  them 
because  saloons  are  closed,  although  they  invariably 
see  them  after  no-license  has  been  in  force  for  some 
time. 

The  fact  that  the  workingmen  in  tke  steel  mill 
referred  to  wanted  to  work  seven  days  per  week, 
twelve  hours  per  day,  was  one  of  the  strongest  ar- 
guments against  the  request  made  by  the  steel  com- 
pany. Because  if  working  such  long  periods  of  time 
as  these  men  had  done  had  the  effect  of  making  them 
prefer  to  work  almost  continuously  during  their  wak- 
ing hours  in  a  steel  mill  rather  than  spend  one  day 
per  week  with  their  families  or  in  securing  recrea- 
tion, it  was  an  indication  that  the  influence  of  such 
labour  was  decidedly  injurious. 

Surrounding  this  particular  steel  mill  there  were 
scores  of  saloons,  and  at  the  close  of  the  shift  the 
men  rushed  to  these  saloons,  standing  about  the  bars, 
five  deep,  completely  exhausted,  and  needing  arti- 
ficial stimulants.  The  man  who  deliberately  wears 
himself  out  in  this  fashion  makes  it  harder  to  raise 
the  level  of  living  of  all  other  workers,  nor  can 
such  a  man  be  a  normal  father  and  husband,  and 
it  is  needless  to  add  that  he  cannot  be  a  good  citizen. 

If  the  request  of  this  steel  company  had  been 
granted,  it  would  have  jeopardised  the  interests  of 
all  the  workers  in  the  State  who  were  engaged  in 
continuous  operations. 

Therefore,  if  a  seven  day  week  not  only  injures 
the  workingman  himself,  but  his  family  and  the 


Personal  Liberty  and  Prohibition      79 

State,  then  the  State  has  a  right  and  a  duty  to  pre- 
vent that  man  from  working  seven  days  per  week 
to  save  the  State  and  the  man. 

The  trade  unionist  should  be  the  last  man  in  the 
world  to  talk  about  "personal  liberty." 

Suppose  a  strike  were  ordered  on  the  job  upon 
which  the  trade  unionist  is  working,  would  he  dare 
resist  the  strike  order? 

Suppose  it  had  been  decided  by  the  labour  union 
that  eight  hours  constituted  a  day's  work,  would 
he  dare  work  nine  or  ten  or  twelve? 

Suppose  the  labour  union  law  declared  that  there 
should  be  no  Sunday  work,  would  a  trade  unionist 
insist  upon  working  a  seven  day  week  if  he  felt  like 
doing  so? 

Suppose  the  rules  of  the  union  prohibited  him 
from  working  with  non-union  men,  would  he  be  found 
on  the  same  job  with  such  men? 

Practically  every  demand  of  the  labour  union  in- 
fringes upon  the  "personal  liberty"  of  the  trade 
unionist.  The  doctrine  of  personal  liberty  is  a  relic 
of  the  old  Manchester  School  of  extreme  individual- 
ism. There  is  absolutely  no  room  for  this  philoso- 
phy in  the  trade  union  movement.  The  doctrine  of 
personal  liberty  carried  out  to  its  logical  conclusion 
would  wipe  out  every  labour  union  in  the  world. 

The  best  possible  argument  for  the  labour  union 
is  that  it  looks  upon  the  problems  of  the  workers 
from  the  standpoint  of  the  great  mass  of  working- 
men  and  not  from  the  standpoint  of  the  individual. 


8o  Why  Prohibition! 

When  a  man  joins  a  labour  union  he  forfeits  his 
personal  liberty  for  the  common  interest  of  the  work- 
ingmen  of  his  class. 

The  labour  union  takes  care  of  the  weakest  man — 
the  one  who  is  least  able  to  defend  himself,  brings 
him  into  the  organisation  and  then  stands  by  him 
to  the  limit.  It  does  the  same  thing  for  women  and 
children  who  cannot  fight  their  own  battles.  The 
fight  for  prohibition  is  based  upon  much  the  same 
principle — its  chief  object  is  to  take  care  of  the 
weakest  members  of  society. 

If  every  man  may  do  as  he  pleases  about  the 
liquor  business,  then  by  the  same  token  he  may  do 
as  he  pleases  about  the  labour  business.  What,  then, 
is  the  use  of  insisting  that  a  boss  must  unionise  his 
shop  if  every  man  may  do  as  he  pleases?  What's 
the  sense  of  compelling  him  to  run  his  plant  upon 
an  eight  hour  basis?  Why  should  we  declare  with 
fervour  that  he  must  pay  the  union  scale  of  wages? 

But  labour  men  are  right  when  they  stand  to- 
gether to  secure  justice.  They  must  insist  upon  the 
bosses  giving  their  fellows  a  square  deal  in  indus- 
try, even  though  it  may  mean  a  sacrifice  for  the  great 
hody  of  workers. 

You  can't  do  as  you  please  in  the  industrial  world 
— there  are  too  many  interests  to  be  conserved.  No 
more  dare  you  do  as  you  please  with  regard  to  the 
liquor  business.  Your  personal  liberty  is  the  last 
thing  to  be  considered.  The  first  consideration  is  the 
well-being  of  the  majority. 


Personal  Liberty  and  Prohibition      81 

It  is  rather  interesting  that  the  members  of  the 
"personal  liberty  leagues" — who  stand  for  the  main- 
tenance of  the  liquor  business — become  very  much 
incensed  when  a  fellow-trade  unionist  asserts  his  per- 
sonal liberty  to  vote  as  he  pleases  regarding  the 
liquor  business. 

The  liquor  delegates  at  a  recent  meeting  of  the 
Central  Labor  Union  in  their  city  brought  charges 
against  a  fellow  delegate  because  he  voted  in  favour 
of  the  "Drys" ;  they  wanted  him  thrown  out  of  the 
Central  body  because  he  exercised  his  "personal  lib- 
erty." This  episode  shows  the  insincerity  of  the 
champions  of  the  liquor  industry.  "Personal  lib- 
erty" to  them  means  merely  that  you  shall  think  and 
do  as  they  wish  you  to  do;  no  one  has  a  right  to 
exercise  his  "personal  liberty"  excepting  themselves. 
They  are  fighting  for  their  "personal  liberty" — not 
yours,  or  anybody's  else. 

The  labour  editor  who  declined  to  print  a  paid 
advertisement  of  a  Dry  Mass  meeting,  at  which  only 
trade  unionists  were  to  speak,  but  filled  his  columns 
with  announcements  and  arguments  for  the  liquor 
crowd,  has  lost  his  most  precious  heritage — the  rec- 
ognition of  the  freedom  of  speech  and  of  the  press. 

The  only  "doxy"  which  such  men  recognise  as 
genuine  orthodoxy,  is  their  "doxy." 

If  the  question  of  closing  the  saloon  is  of  such 
extreme  economic  importance  as  to  result  in  a  great 
difference  of  opinion  among  the  rank  and  file  of  the 
members  of  organised  labour,  then,  in  justice  to  all 


82  Why  Prohibition! 

concerned,  each  side  of  this  question  should  be  pre- 
sented with  the  utmost  freedom  and  sincerity  of 
purpose,  for  if  the  men  who  stand  for  the  saloon 
are  wrong,  then  it  is  inevitable  that  their  business 
will  ultimately  be  destroyed,  and  if  those  who  are 
opposed  to  the  saloon  are  right,  then  no  power  on 
earth  or  under  the  earth  can  long  withstand  them. 

The  Labour  Press  is  assumed  to  stand  for  the  best 
interests  of  all  trade-unionists — not  merely  the  in- 
terests of  a  few — and  if  it  is  to  perform  its  duty 
adequately  and  fairly,  its  columns  must  be  open  for 
the  presentation  of  all  the  facts  with  reference  to 
the  effect  and  influence  of  the  liquor  business  both 
now  and  after  it  shall  be  abolished.  In  no  other  way 
can  it  expect  to  have  the  hearty  support  of  the  rank 
and  file  of  the  workers.  It  surely  cannot  afford  to 
wilfully  and  persistently  pervert  the  truth,  or  print 
only  so  much  of  it  as  is  in  accord  with  the  wishes 
of  an  interested  minority — the  liquor  men  in  the  la- 
bour movement. 

Why  should  the  labour  movement  be  made  the 
goat  of  the  liquor  business  when  every  institution 
and  enterprise  having  the  well-being  of  mankind 
at  heart  is  becoming  increasingly  opposed  to  the 
saloon  and  to  the  liquor  business?  Why  should  the 
labour  movement  be  a  trailer  when,  if  its  declara- 
tions are  true  and  its  leaders  are  sincere,  it  stands 
for  the  building  up  of  our  common  humanity?  Why 
should  the  labour  movement  stand  for  the  saloon 
when  everybody  knows  that  the  tendency  of  the  sa- 


Personal  Liberty  and  Prohibition      83 

loon  is  always  against  the  interests  of  the  working- 
man? 

In  order  to  defend  the  position  of  the  liquor  men, 
one  of  their  noted  exponents  quotes  a  Canon  of  the 
early  church  regarding  the  alleged  prohibition  heresy 
of  Tatian  and  his  followers  which  reads:  "If  any 
bishop,  priest,  deacon,  or  layman  abstain  from  wine 
out  of  abhorrence  as  having  forgotten  that  all  things 
are  very  good,  let  him  amend  or  else  be  deposed  and 
cast  out  of  the  Church." 

But  what  about  "personal  liberty"  in  this  case? 
Is  "personal  liberty"  to  be  granted  only  to  the  man 
who  wants  to  drink  and  not  to  the  man  who  prefers 
to  abstain  from  drinking?  The  liquor  men  insist 
that  these  early  churchmen  were  in  harmony  with 
the  divine  order  because  "they  touched  hands  with 
the  disciples  of  Christ."  But,  however  effective  these 
disciples  may  have  been  in  other  regards  or  how 
true  to  the  teachings  of  the  Scripture,  it  does  not 
necessarily  follow  that  they  were  right  in  their  atti- 
tude toward  the  use  of  intoxicating  liquor,  nor  were 
they  infallible  in  setting  up  an  economic  system,  or 
in  establishing  social  customs. 

Many  of  the  early  disciples,  including  some  of  the 
twelve  apostles,  were  in  favour  of  communism;  they 
believed  in  having  all  things  in  common.  The  fact 
that  communism  was  practised  only  a  short  period 
of  time  and  was  given  up  because  it  was  impractica- 
ble, indicated  that  there  was  something  fundamen- 
tally wrong  with  it. 


84  Why  Prohibition! 

And  so,  whatever  may  have  been  the  teachings  of 
the  early  disciples  regarding  the  use  of  liquor,  they 
changed  their  minds  on  this  as  well  as  on  many 
other  subjects,  as  their  experience  increased  and 
their  knowledge  broadened. 

In  law  and  in  civilisation  the  first  consideration  is 
not  the  individual,  but  society.  Therefore,  whatever 
injures  society  is  not  permitted.  The  greater  our 
civilisation,  the  more  restricted  become  our  liber- 
ties. You  may  enjoy  civic  liberty  only  as  you  are 
willing  to  sacrifice  personal  liberty. 

This  does  not  mean  that  you  are  actually  sur- 
rendering anything.  Each  of  us  is  asked  to  give  up 
some  little  things  and  put  them  into  the  common 
fund  which  makes  up  the  sum  of  all  our  comforts 
in  a  civilised  community,  but  each  of  us  draws  out 
of  that  common  fund  much  more  than  any  of  us 
puts  in. 

You  may  exercise  your  personal  liberty  only  in  so 
far  as  you  do  not  place  additional  burdens  upon 
your  neighbours,  or  upon  the  State. 

No  man  has  a  right  to  drink  if  by  so  doing  he 
poisons  himself  or  makes  himself  an  unfit  member  of 
society,  compelling  the  State  to  cure  him,  support 
him  when  he  is  unable  to  take  care  of  himself,  lock 
him  up  when  he  is  dangerous  to  be  at  large,  bury 
him  at  public  expense  when  he  is  a  corpse,  and  take 
care  of  his  family  after  he  is  gone. 

No  normal  man  would  prefer  to  live  in  a  state 
of  barbarism  where  every  one  does  absolutely  as 


Personal  Liberty  and  Prohibition      85 

he  pleases  without  regard  to  the  well-being  of  his 
neighbours.  He  would  rather  make  some  sacrifices 
which  mean  comparatively  little  to  him  in  order  that 
he,  too,  might  make  a  contribution  to  the  civilisa- 
tion which  is  bringing  so  much  happiness  and  com- 
fort to  all. 

When  a  man  thinks  there  is  no  other  place  under 
God's  heaven  in  which  he  can  drink  liquor  except  in 
the  saloon,  and  if  he  insists  upon  exercising  his  per- 
sonal liberty  in  order  to  carry  out  his  desires,  he 
is  asking  thousands  of  men  and  women  to  make  a 
greater  sacrifice  and  to  suffer  infinitely  more  because 
the  saloon  is  licensed,  than  he  would  suffer  or  sac- 
rifice were  he  to  give  up  his  right  to  patronise  the 
saloon. 

Robinson  Crusoe  upon  his  desert  island  could  do 
as  he  pleased,  but  on  the  day  that  he  saw  the  foot- 
prints of  his  man  Friday  on  the  shore  his  liberty 
was  cut  in  two.  He  had  to  reckon  with  Friday,  even 
though  he  never  saw  him;  the  fact  that  he  was  on 
the  island  with  him  compelled  Robinson  Crusoe  to 
consider  him. 

You  cannot  do  as  you  please  in  a  democracy — 
not  even  with  the  things  that  are  most  precious  to 
you.  There's  your  body,  for  example.  You've  ten- 
derly cared  for  it  all  through  its  life.  Suppose  you 
try  to  kill  it — to  commit  suicide. 

If  you  succeed,  Billy  Sunday  says  you'll  go  to  hell. 

If  you  fail,  the  law  says  you'll  go  to  jail. 

But  suppose  to-morrow  morning  the  conscription 


86  Why  Prohibition! 

officer  should  call  on  you  to  go  to  war,  with  the 
chances  that  your  precious  body  will  be  shot  to  pieces 
in  the  trenches. 

And  suppose  you  should  say  to  the  conscription 
officer,  "Go  way,  mister;  I  don't  believe  in  war — I 
am  for  peace." 

It  wouldn't  matter  what  you  believed  about  war 
— you'd  go  to  the  Front.  What  you  dared  not  do 
to  your  own  body  the  State  has  a  right  to  do,  be- 
cause in  a  democracy  the  chief  consideration  is  not 
the  individual  but  society,  or  the  State. 

But  you  wouldn't  wait  to  have  the  conscription 
officer  compel  you  to  go  to  war.  You'd  go  because 
— and  now  read  this  carefully — because  you  want 
to  do  all  you  can  to  make  uthe  world  safe  for 
democracy."  You  are  ready  to  sacrifice  yourself  that 
others  may  be  blessed. 

That's  why  men  are  being  asked  to  surrender 
their  personal  liberty  in  regard  to  the  liquor  ques- 
tion. They  are  asked  to  consider  this  matter  from 
the  standpoint  of  the  citizen  whose  chief  concern 
is  for  the  welfare  of  all  the  people. 

It  is  much  easier  for  six  people  to  live  together 
in  peace  than  it  is  for  six  hundred  to  live  in  har- 
mony. But  there  are  one  hundred  million  of  us 
in  this  country,  and  each  of  us  thinks  that  he  is  just 
as  good  as  the  other  fellow,  if  not  a  little  bit  bet- 
ter. Suppose  each  of  us  tried  to  do  just  as  we 
pleased?  It  would  create  a  hopeless  situation. 

Justinian  has  reduced  the  whole  doctrine  of  law 


Personal  Liberty  and  Prohibition      87 

to  these  principles:  "That  we  should  live  honestly, 
should  hurt  nobody,  and  should  render  to  every  one 
his  due." 

If  these  principles  were  applied  to  the  liquor  busi- 
ness, and  all  that  goes  with  it,  there  would  be  no 
room  for  it.  Blackstone,  the  great  authority  on  law, 
says:  "If  man  were  to  live  in  a  state  of  nature  un- 
connected with  other  individuals,  there  would  be 
no  occasion  for  any  other  law  than  the  law  of  na- 
ture and  the  law  of  God.  Neither  could  any  other 
law  possibly  exist,  for  a  law  always  supposes  some 
superior  who  is  to  make  it,  and  in  a  state  of  nature 
we  are  all  equal  without  any  other  superior  but  Him 
who  is  the  author  of  our  being.  But  man  was 
formed  for  society  and,  as  is  demonstrated  by  the 
writers  on  this  subject,  is  neither  capable  of  living 
alone  nor  indeed  has  the  courage  to  do  it.  The  com- 
munity should  guard  the  rights  of  each  individual 
member,  and  in  return  for  this  protection  each  in- 
dividual should  submit  to  the  law  of  the  community, 
without  which  submission  of  all  it  is  impossible  that 
protection  should  be  extended  to  any." 

Blackstone  further  says:  "Every  man  when  he  en- 
ters into  society  gives  up  a  part  of  his  natural  lib- 
erty, as  the  price  of  so  valuable  a  purchase;  and, 
in  consideration  of  receiving  the  advantages  of  mu- 
tual commerce,  obliges  himself  to  conform  to  those 
laws  which  the  community  has  thought  proper  to  es- 
tablish. And  this  species  of  legal  obedience  and 
conformity  is  infinitely  more  desirable  than  that  wild 


88 


Why  Prohibition! 


and  savage  liberty  which  is  sacrificed  to  obtain  it. 
For  no  man,  who  considers  a  moment,  would  wish 
to  retain  the  absolute  and  uncontrolled  power  of  do- 
ing whatever  he  pleases;  the  consequence  of  which 
is,  that  every  other  man  also  have  the  same  power 
and  then  there  would  be  no  security  to  individuals 
in  any  of  the  enjoyments  of  life. 

"Hence  we  may  collect  that  the  law,  which  re- 
strains a  man  from  doing  mischief  to  his  fellow- 
citizens,  though  it  diminishes  the  natural,  increases 
the  civil  liberty  of  mankind.  Laws  when  prudently 
framed  are  by  no  means  subversive,  but  rather  in- 
troductive  of  liberty,  for  as  Mr.  Locke  has  well  ob- 
served, where  there  is  no  law  there  is  no  freedom. 
The  constitution  or  frame  of  government,  while  it 
leaves  the  individual  the  entire  master  of  his  own 
conduct,  nevertheless  restricts  or  restrains  him  when- 
ever the  public's  good  is  affected." 

According  to  Blackstone,  a  man's  personal  lib- 
erty is  restricted  by  certain  great  fundamental  facts. 
For  example,  he  points  out  that  life  is  the  immediate 
gift  of  God.  Therefore,  this  life  cannot  be  taken 
away,  that  is,  it  cannot  be  destroyed,  not  even  by 
the  person  himself,  nor  by  any  other  of  his  fellow 
creatures  merely  upon  their  own  authority.  Hence, 
the  State  has  a  right  to  preserve  a  man's  health  from 
such  practices  as  may  prejudice  or  annoy  it.  If, 
therefore,  any  institution  or  custom  in  the  community 
has  a  tendency  to  destroy  life  or  health,  the  State  has 
a  right  to  abolish  such  institution  or  custom. 


Personal  Liberty  and  Prohibition      89 

When  the  manufacture  of  liquor  makes  life 
more  burdensome  to  all  the  people,  and  when  it  cre- 
ates social  and  economic  problems  which  threaten 
to  destroy  the  finest  things  in  human  life;  when  it 
destroys  men's  bodies  and  souls  and  becomes  a  men- 
ace to  society,  then  we  have  a  right  to  destroy  the 
liquor  traffic — even  though  it  may  cause  some  incon- 
venience to  a  comparatively  few  people  who  insist 
upon  exercising  their  personal  liberty. 

We  accept  this  principle  in  every  other  relation- 
ship in  life — why  not  accept  it  with  regard  to  the 
liquor  business? 


VI 

Workingmen  and  the  Saloon 

A  STUDY  of  how  workingmen  spend  their  spare 
time  was  recently  made  by  George  E.  Bevans  in  co- 
operation with  the  writer's  office  staff.  Over  one  thou- 
sand workingmen  in  large  cities  were  interviewed; 
about  one-third  of  these  admitted  that  they  patron- 
ised the  saloon,  although  more  than  one-half  used 
liquor  in  some  form.  ^ 

In  summing  up  the  results  of  this  investigation, 
the  men  were  divided  into  groups  according  to  the 
number  of  hours  worked  per  day.  It  was  brought 
out  in  this  study  that,  in  general,  the  men  who  worked 
the  longest  hours  per  day  drank  the  most  liquor. 
For  example,  when  the  men  were  asked  the  ques- 
tion, "Do  you  drink  liquor  before  going  to  work?" 
the  following  were  the  percentages: 

From  8  to  9  hours 10. 1  Jo 

From  9  to  10  hours 17.0% 

From  10  to  1 1  hours 14-5% 

1 1  and  over  hours 19-3% 

The  total  number  of  men  in  the  entire  group  who 
drink  liquor  at  noon  was  5 1.3  per  cent.,  or  more  than 

90 


Workingmen  and  the  Saloon      91 

one-half.  It  must  not  be  imagined,  however,  that 
all  of  the  men  who  drink  liquor  before  going  to  work 
or  at  the  noon  hour  patronise  the  saloon.  They  ap- 
parently have  other  means  of  supplying  themselves 
with  intoxicants. 

It  will  be  seen,  therefore,  that  the  closing  of  the 
saloon  in  the  neighbourhood  of  shops  and  factories 
doesn't  do  away  with  the  evil  of  the  liquor  habit, 
and  the  figures  given  above  prove  it.  It  must,  there- 
fore, be  obvious  that  the  liquor  problem  is  an  edu- 
cational and  economic  problem  as  well  as  a  political 
or  legislative  question. 

Along  side  of  the  fact  that  the  man  who  works 
the  longest  hours  spends  most  time  in  the  saloon, 
because  he  seems  to  need  artificial  stimulants,  came 
the  further  revelation  tharAmarried  men  spend  more 
time  in  the  saloon  than  single  men.) 

This  may  be  accounted  for  in  part  by  the  fact 
that  the  younger  men  are  more  idealistic.  They 
spend  much  of  their  time  with  their  sweethearts  and 
they  are  occupied  with  their  studies.  Life  has  not 
lost  its  zest  for  them.  During  their  leisure  hours 
they  are  engaged  in  profitable  occupations,  fitting 
themselves  for  the  duties  of  life. 

(The  ages  between  35  and  45  seem  to  be  the  most 
perilous  period  in  a  man's  life,  according  to  this 
study.  At  this  time  the  average  workingman  has 
distinctly  slumped;  life  hasn't  much  of  an  outlook 
for  him,  for  if  he  hasn't  made  good  at  forty,  he  is 
practically  done  for,  so  far  as  the  bigger  things  ahead 


92  Why  Prohibition! 

are  concerned,  and  so  the  saloon  occupies  most  of 
his  spare  time.,* 

Each  of  the  workingmen  interviewed  was  asked 
for  what  objects  he  spent  his  spare  cash — by  spare 
cash  being  meant  money  not  spent  for  the  necessi- 
ties of  life< — and  to  help  him  in  his  thinking,  the  fol- 
lowing items  were  tabulated: 

Motion  pictures,  theatre,  beer,  wine,  whiskey, 
chewing  tobacco,  smoking  tobacco,  cigars,  cigarettes, 
personal  contributions  to  church,  family  contribu- 
tions to  church,  self  life  insurance,  family  life  insur- 
ance. 

If  the  total  number  of  ways  in  which  this  money 
was  spent  were  represented  by  100  per  cent.,  beer 
took  about  23  per  cent,  of  the  total,  but  if  we  in- 
clude beer,  wine  and  whiskey,  the  total  amounts  to 
about  34  per  cent,  of  the  total  spent  for  all  pur- 
poses. Motion  picture  shows  and  theatres  required 
about  24  per  cent,  of  the  total;  tobacco  consumed  24 
per  cent. ;  life  insurance  required  1 1  per  cent. ;  the 
church  got  a  little  over  6  per  cent. 

It  is  evident  from  the  comparison  of  the  hour 
groups  that  men  working  the  lesser  number  of  hours 
per  day  use  their  spare  time  more  wisely  and  more 
uniformly  than  do  men  in  the  longer  hour  groups. 
Men  who  work  the  greatest  number  of  hours  per 
day  seek  in  the  use  of  their  spare  time,  first,  rest 
and  then  recreation  that  comes  cheaply  and  easily — 
and  the  saloon  usually  furnishes  the  latter  in  the 
most  effective  fashion  possible. 


Workingmen  and  the  Saloon      93 

The  study  indicated  that  to  give  workingmen  an 
equal  number  of  hours  of  leisure  would  tend  to  es- 
tablish a  uniform  standard  for  spending  spare  time. 
It  also  showed  that  there  is  no  justification  for  the 
argument  that,  if  workingmen  were  given  a  shorter 
work-day,  they  would  spend  more  time  in  the  saloon 
— quite  the  opposite  was  proven  to  be  the  case. 

Workingmen  naturally  protest  against  being  sin- 
gled out  as  a  class  and  held  up  as  "horrible  exam- 
ples" of  what  drink  will  do  to  a  man. 

Therefore,  at  the  convention  of  the  American 
Federation  of  Labor  in  San  Francisco  the  follow- 
ing resolution  was  introduced  and  unanimously 
adopted : 

"WHEREAS,  It  is  a  familiar  thing  in  moving  pic- 
tures to  exhibit  scenes  of  drunkenness  in  which  the 
principal  actors  are  represented  as  workingmen ;  and, 

"WHEREAS,  The  place  of  revelry  and  excess  in 
many  instances  is  shown  as  a  saloon  or  cafe  of  the 
type  generally  patronised  by  workingmen;  and, 

"WHEREAS,  The  constant  parading  before  the 
minds  of  the  people  of  the  United  States  of  the  un- 
truthful statement  that  drunkenness  and  debauchery 
are  common  among  the  toilers  and  the  poor  is  a 
stigma  upon  the  entire  labouring  element  of  the 
United  States;  therefore,  be  it 

"Resolved,  That  we  as  representative  workers 
unanimously  disapprove  and  condemn  such  pictures 
as  described  above  and  protest  against  them  as  be- 
ing unfair  to  that  vast  army  of  sober  and  Indus- 


94  Why  Prohibition! 

trious  men  who  form  the  ranks  of  the  labour  unions 
of  the  United  States." 

Workingmen  are  becoming  increasingly  sensitive 
when  the  liquor  question  is  under  consideration. 
They  insist  that  they  are  not  drunken,  but  that  all 
the  tendencies  among  them  are  toward  more  tem- 
perate living.  This  is  undoubtedly  true,  especially 
among  the  higher  grade  workingmen. 

But  if  it's  a  bad  thing  for  a  workingman  to  drink 
booze,  it  must  be  still  worse  for  the  boss  to  drink 
booze. 

It's  worse,  because  more  depends  upon  the  boss, 
in  the  matter  of  efficiency  and  general  prosperity, 
than  upon  the  workingman. 

Nobody  will  deny  that  there's  a  necessity  for  con- 
ducting anti-saloon  campaigns  among  the  toilers. 
But  there's  just  as  great  a  need  to  conduct  similar 
campaigns  among  the  bosses. 

Every^  boss  who  is  interested  in  having  his  men 
remain  sober  should  be  consistent  and  remain  sober 
himself.  We  have  often  been  told  that  capital  and 
labour  are  partners — that  their  interests  are  com- 
mon. If  this  is  true,  then  workingmen  have  as  much 
right  to  protest  against  the  drinking  boss  as  the  boss 
has  to  protest  against  the  drinking  workingmen. 
When  the  boss  patronises  the  saloon  it  means  not 
only  smaller  profits  for  himself,  but  less  work  for 
his  men.  If  there's  any  virtue  in  the  bosses  band- 
ing together  for  a  temperance  campaign  among  the 
rank  and  file  of  the  workers,  there's  equal  consistency 


Workingmen  and  the  Saloon      95 

in  the  workingmen  organising  in  order  to  keep  the 
bosses  sober. 

What's  "booze"  for  the  workers  is  "booze"  for 
the  bosses — it  hits  them  all  in  the  same  place  and 
in  the  same  way. 

Let's  take  this  for  granted  in  the  discussion  in 
this  chapter.  But,  nevertheless,  it's  worth  while  to 
consider  the  entire  subject  from  the  standpoint  of 
the  worker,  because  it  does  concern  him  vitally. 

And  here's  an  illustration: 

Because  Bill  Jones  "boozes"  he's  worth  $2.50  a 
day.  Because  Jim  Smith  is  sober  and  clear-headed 
he's  worth  $3.50  a  day.  But  the  boss  must  strike 
a  fair  average,  so  he  pays  each  $3.00  a  day. 

If  there  are  two  men  like  drinking  Bill  Jones  in 
the  shop,  and  one  like  sober  Jim  Smith,  the  average 
wage  will  probably  be  only  $2.75  a  day.  But  if  there 
are  two  men  like  Jim  Smith  and  only  one  man  like 
Bill  Jones,  their  wage  will  likely  be  $3.25  a  day. 

The  more  men  like  drunken  Bill  Jones  there 
are  In  a  shop,  the  lower  will  be  the  average  wage. 
The  more  men  like  sober  Jim  Smith,  the  higher  the 
wage. 

Anyway,  that's  the  way  the  ordinary  boss  figures 
it.  He  must  strike  a  fair  average,  because  he  has  all 
kinds  of  men  in  the  shop. 

The  advantage  to  the  sober  man  is  that  he's  the 
last  man  laid  off,  and  the  first  man  taken  on,  and 
he  has  a  better  chance  for  promotion.  But  even  he 


96  Why  Prohibition! 

is  bound  to  suffer,  because  some  other  man  persists 
in  getting  drunk  or  even  drinking  "moderately." 

In  such  a  situation  there  can  be  no  such  thing 
as  "personal  liberty."  No  man  has  the  right  to 
degrade  his  fellow-workers  through  his  personal 
habits. 

If  the  low  grade  man  were  the  victim  of  an  un- 
fortunate handicap  for  which  he  could  not  be  held 
responsible,  it  would  be  a  different  matter. 

But  any  workingman  who  deliberately  lowers 
standards  for  all  his  fellows  simply  because  he 
chooses  to  debase  himself  through  the  use  of  strong 
drink,  should  be  regarded  as  a  traitor  to  the  cause 
of  labour. 

Fifty  workmen  were  taken  out  of  the  steel  mills 
in  Chicago  and  transferred  to  better  positions  in 
Pittsburgh.  They  had  been  carefully  selected  be- 
cause of  their  superior  ability  from  among  thousands 
employed  in  the  mills. 

Their  friends  gave  them  a  supper  when  they  were 
about  to  leave,  and  furnished  plenty  of  booze  for 
the  occasion. 

But  to  the  amazement  of  the  hosts  every  last  one 
of  the  fifty  workmen  turned  down  his  glass  when 
the  booze  was  passed.  This  act  was  at  least  one  in- 
dication as  to  why  the  fifty  were  selected  for  the 
bigger  and  better  jobs. 

No  doubt  the  friends  who  had  gathered  to  bid 
them  farewell  were  impressed  by  the  action  of  their 
guests.  It  probably  took  a  lot  of  nerve  for  these 


Workingmen  and  the  Saloon      97 

workmen  to  stand  by  their  convictions  regarding 
the  liquor  question. 

Most  men  would  have  argued  that  this  surely  was 
the  one  occasion  when  it  was  only  fair  that  they 
should  be  "decent"  to  their  friends,  and  drink  at 
least  a  glass  of  wine,  thereby  showing  their  appre- 
ciation. The  fact  is,  they  turned  down  champagne 
which  their  friends  had  bought  to  celebrate  the 
occasion. 

And  this  is  in  line  with  the  increasing  tendency 
on  the  part  of  the  high-grade  artisans  to  cut  out 
booze. 

Seamen  are  presumed  to  be  peculiarly  addicted 
to  the  use  of  strong  drink.  The  phrase  ua  drunken 
sailor"  has  become  a  byword,  but  booze  has  hit  the 
sailor  man  so  hard  that  he  has  long  since  been  cut- 
ting it  out. 

In  San  Francisco  the  National  Seamen's  Union 
has  a  building  of  its  own.  The  lower  part  of  it  is 
a  store,  but  it  stood  vacant  for  nearly  two  years — 
although  it  might  repeatedly  have  been  rented  for 
saloon  purposes  at  a  very  good  price.  The  Seamen's 
Union  declined  to  rent  to  a  saloonkeeper. 

There  were  saloons  to  the  left  of  it,  to  the  right 
of  it,  and  saloons  abreast  of  it,  and  the  argument 
might  easily  have  been  raised,  "What  does  it  matter 
— one  saloon  more  or  less?  It  can't  hurt  anybody." 

But  the  Seamen's  Union  stood  staunchly  against 
the  booze  business. 

The  action  of  an  increasing  number  of  employ- 


98  Why  Prohibition! 

ers  insisting  that  their  workmen  shall  not  drinK 
booze  while  "on  the  job"  is  "sinking  the  workmen 
lower  than  the  slaves  of  ante-bellum  days,"  accord- 
ing to  a  prominent  liquor  sellers'  journal. 

The  increased  profits  which  come  to  the  bosses 
because  their  workmen  are  sober  is  counted  "blood 
money"  by  the  editor  of  this  paper.  The  fact  that 
these  sober  workmen  themselves  earn  and  receive 
a  considerable  portion  of  this  "blood  money"  is  not, 
of  course,  mentioned. 

That  bosses  seek  to  protect  themselves  against 
the  payment  of  accident  indemnities  because  those 
injured  or  killed  were  intoxicated,  or  at  least  befud- 
dled by  strong  drink,  is  regarded  as  the  basest 
tyranny  and  oppression ! 

What  does  it  matter  that  thousands  may  have 
their  lives  endangered  on  railroad  trains — the  rail- 
road man  must  have  his  booze,  because,  otherwise, 
he  will  become  just  "a  common  slave  and  chattel  of 
the  railroad  company." 

The  bosses  must  not  have  their  profits  increased 
because  their  men  are  sober,  because  when  workmen 
are  sober  the  profits  of  the  booze  sellers  are  de- 
creased. 

And  that  any  boss  should  regard  the  health  and 
life  of  his  employes  as  more  to  be  desired  than 
accident  insurance  money,  is  beyond  the  conception 
of  the  booze  dealer's  defender! 

In  a  more  general  way  workingmen  themselves 


Workingmen  and  the  Saloon      99 

have  bitterly  complained  about  "tainted  money'1 — 
blood  money,  as  the  liquor  editor  puts  it. 

In  some  instances  they  have  not  permitted  cities 
in  which  they  lived  to  accept  gifts  from  certain  capi- 
talists, because,  they  declared,  these  gifts  were  pur- 
chased with  "blood  money." 

Whatever  may  be  true  of  the  particular  indus- 
tries in  which  this  money  was  wrung  from  helpless 
people,  no  other  industry  has  produced  more  "blood 
money"  than  the  liquor  business. 

The  story  is  as  old  as  strong  drink  itself. 

Hopes  have  been  crushed,  lives  have  been  blighted, 
families  have  been  destroyed,  cities  have  been  ruined, 
nations  have  been  wrecked  on  account  of  strong 
drink. 

There  is  a  great  difference  between  "blood  money" 
in  the  average  industry  and  "blood  money"  in  the 
liquor  business. 

While  the  profits  in  both  the  average  industry  and 
in  the  liquor  industry  go  largely  to  the  bosses,  the 
products  in  the  first  group  of  industries  usually  bless 
mankind,  whereas  the  products  of  the  liquor  indus- 
try curse  mankind. 

The  workers  in  other  industries  engaged  in  ac- 
cumulating money  which  has  upon  it  the  taint  of 
blood  are  often  themselves  innocent  victims,  and 
deserve  our  sympathy;  whereas  the  workers  in  the 
liquor  industry  are  definitely  and  knowingly  produc- 
ing material  which  too  often  causes  the  destruction 


loo  Why  Prohibition! 

of  men,  and  we  have  a  right  to  condemn  both  them 
and  their  business. 

The  money  made  in  the  liquor  business  is  "blood 
money,"  and  if  labour  is  to  be  consistent  it  cannot 
defend  those  who  are  engaged  in  any  branch  of  this 
business — whether  they  make  liquor  or  sell  it, 
whether  they  receive  their  profit  in  dividends  or  in 
wages. 

Labour  and  liquor  have  absolutely  nothing  in  com- 
mon. Their  interests  have  always  been  diametri- 
cally opposed.  The  only  salvation  for  labour  is  to 
let  liquor  alone,  and  to  be  free  from  all  entangle- 
ments with  those  who  produce  it  or  dispose  of  it 
for  beverage  purposes. 

Working  for  the  liquor  business  is  a  "steady  job" 
« — according  to  the  liquor  men  themselves.  This  is 
what  they  tell  workingmen,  so  that  they  may  continue 
to  vote  for  the  liquor  business,  in  order  that  those 
who  are  engaged  in  this  business  may  hold  these 
"steady  jobs." 

But  the  records  that  Uncle  Sam  makes  regarding 
the  steadiness  of  employment  do  not  agree  with  the 
statements  issued  by  the  liquor  men. 

In  some  tables  printed  in  the  Statistical  Abstract 
<pf  the  United  States  there  is  given  the  number  of 
wage-earners  employed  from  month  to  month  during 
a  given  year  in  259  different  manufacturing  indus- 
tries. These  figures  naturally  show  some  variation, 
as  men  are  laid  off  during  dull  seasons. 

If  the  minimum  month  in  all  these  industries,  that 


Workingmen  and  the  Sa?ooh    irti 

is,  the  month  in  which  the  lowest  number  of  men 
were  employed,  were  compared  with  the  maximum 
month,  that  is,  the  month  in  which  the  highest  num- 
ber of  men  were  employed,  the  percentage  of  the 
minimum  of  the  maximum  would  be  88.6.  This 
means  that  there  were  11.4  per  cent,  fewer  men  em- 
ployed in  the  low  month  than  there  were  in  the  high 
month. 

Now,  then,  how  does  the  liquor  industry  stack  up 
with  this  average  for  all  industries?  Here  are  the 
percentages : 

Vinous  liquors 36.6  per  cent. 

Distilled   liquors    69.3  per  cent. 

Malt  liquors 87.9  per  cent. 

These  figures  prove  that  instead  of  there  being 
a  variation  of  only  11.4  per  cent,  between  the  high- 
est and  the  lowest  months,  as  is  the  case  in  the  aver- 
age industry  in  the  United  States,  there  is  in  the 
vinous  liquors  a  variation  of  63.4  per  cent.,  in  dis- 
tilled liquors  a  variation  of  30.7  per  cent,  and  in  malt 
liquors  a  variation  of  12.1  per  cent. 

There  were  only  41  out  of  the  259  industries 
which  had  a  lower  percentage  of  unemployment  than 
the  distilled  liquor  industry,  and  90  industries  showed 
a  higher  percentage  of  steady  employment  than  the 
malt  liquor  industry. 

It  makes  a  lot  of  difference  whether  a  teamster 
works  for  a  brewery  or  some  other  business  enter- 
prise— we  are  told  by  the  liquor  men. 


:1O2  ,  Why.  Prohibition! 

That's  right.  It  makes  more  difference  than  even 
the  liquor  men  are  ready  to  admit.  The  men  who 
drive  brewery  wagons  are  subject  to  many  of  the 
disadvantages  which  are  common  to  other  men  who 
are  employed  by  breweries. 

They  do  not  live  as  long  as  do  other  teamsters. 
They  soon  become  unfit  for  jobs  which  the  ordinary 
teamster  is  constantly  called  upon  to  do.  The  longer 
they  remain  in  the  brewery  business,  the  less  likely 
they  are  to  get  jobs  as  regular  teamsters,  because 
they  are  unequal  to  the  physical  and  mental  require- 
ments demanded  in  the  regular  teamster's  occupa- 
tion. 

"Anyway,  these  brewery  teamsters  get  higher 
wages  than  regular  teamsters,"  we  are  informed. 

They  are  paid  higher  wages  than  are  paid  some 
teamsters  in  some  towns,  but  most  "skilled"  team- 
sters in  our  big  cities  are  paid  just  about  as  much 
as  brewery  teamsters  receive.  Furthermore,  brew- 
ery teamsters  work  only  about  nine  or  ten  months 
of  the  year,  and  are  frequently  assessed  to  "fight  the 
Prohibitionists,"  whereas  other  teamsters  work 
practically  during  the  entire  year, — that  is,  they  have 
steady  jobs,  which  is  more  than  can  be  said  for  the 
brewery  drivers. 

Wherever  brewery  wagon  drivers  are  paid  more 
than  other  teamsters,  it  is  not  because  brewery  own- 
ers are  kinder  or  more  humane  than  other  employers, 
but  because  they  have  been  compelled  by  the  brewery 
workers'  labour  union  to  pay  them  higher  wages. 


Workingmen  and  the  Saloon     103 

There  is  no  reason  why  other  teamsters  of  equal 
skill  as  the  brewery  wagon  drivers  may  not  receive 
fully  as  much  as  they  receive.  It  is  largely  a  ques- 
tion of  having  a  reasonable  and  intelligent  labour 
organisation. 

That  saloonkeepers  levy  tribute  from  the  unem- 
ployed before  they  help  them  find  jobs  was  brought 
out  by  the  President  of  the  Cooks,  Hotel  and  Res- 
taurant Workers'  Union  in  Chicago,  at  an  unemploy- 
ment conference  held  in  that  city. 

The  hotel  men  are  largely  responsible  for  this 
situation.  They  insist  that  those  who  want  jobs 
must  do  business  with  a  particular  saloonkeeper. 

And  the  saloonkeeper  works  the  graft  to  the  limit. 
He  compels  men  to  wait  in  his  saloon  while  he  bleeds 
them,  the  man  patronising  his  bar  most  having  the 
best  chance  for  getting  a  job. 

This  fact  was  brought  out  in  detail  by  the  Illinois 
Chief  Inspector  of  private  employment  agencies, 
according  to  the  Survey. 

Probably  the  reason  why  the  hotel  men  prefer  to 
deal  with  the  saloonkeeper  in  securing  help  is  be- 
cause they  do  not  pay  him  the  usual  fee,  the  law 
prohibiting  the  saloonkeeper  from  charging  a  fee. 
But  he  must  get  his  profit  somewhere,  so  he  takes  it 
out  of  the  workingmen  who  apply  to  him  for  jobs. 

If  the  social  workers  and  the  labour  leaders  get 
together  on  this  job,  there's  no  doubt  they  will  be 
able  to  convince  the  hotel  men  that  they  are  "penny- 


104  Why  Prohibition! 

wise  and  pound-foolish"  in  having  the  saloonkeeper 
serve  as  their  employment  agent. 

The  liquor  industry  is  one  of  the  greatest  monopo- 
lies in  industrial  life.  For  several  years  a  process 
of  concentration  has  been  going  on  in  this  business, 
the  result  of  which  has  been  anything  but  beneficial 
to  workingmen. 

It  is  true  that  some  other  industries  have  been 
undergoing  a  process  of  concentration,  but  compared 
with  manufacturing  establishments,  as  a  whole, 
throughout  the  United  States,  the  liquor  industry 
has  far  exceeded  the  average  industrial  enterprise 
in  this  particular. 

For  example,  among  all  the  manufacturing  estab- 
lishments in  1904,  23.6  per  cent,  were  operated  by 
corporations,  and  in  1909,  25.9  per  cent,  were  oper- 
ated by  corporations.  Whereas  in  the  liquor  indus- 
try, as  a  whole,  58  per  cent,  were  in  1909  conducted 
as  corporations.  However,  in  malt  liquors — that  is, 
brewing  establishments — 60.8  per  cent,  were  in  1904 
operated  as  corporations,  but  in  1909,  70.4  per  cent, 
were  so  conducted.  Among  industries  as  a  whole 
75.6  per  cent,  of  the  wage-earners  of  this  country 
are  employed  by  corporations,  whereas  in  the  brew- 
ing industry  90.1  per  cent,  are  so  employed. 

From  1904  to  1909  there  was  an  increase  of  all 
manufacturing  establishments  in  the  United  States 
of  24.19  per  cent.  But  in  the  liquor  industry  there 
was  a  decrease  in  the  number  of  establishments  of 
16.34  per  cent.  During  the  same  period  in  all  man- 


Workingmen  and  the  Saloon     105 

ufacturing  industries  there  was  an  increase  in  the 
number  of  proprietors  or  firm  members  of  21.9  per 
cent.,  while  in  the  liquor  industry  there  was  a  de- 
crease of  30.3  per  cent. 

At  first  glance  it  would  appear  from  these  ngures 
that  the  liquor  industry  had  during  this  period  lost 
in  its  importance  as  a  manufacturing  enterprise;  but 
this  is  not  true,  for  we  find  by  referring  to  the  Statis- 
tical Abstract  of  the  United  States  that  during  this 
period  there  was  an  increase  in  the  amount  of  cap- 
ital invested  in  the  liquor  industry  of  32.2  per  cent., 
and  an  increase  in  the  cost  of  raw  materials  of  31 
per  cent.,  showing  that  what  actually  took  place  was 
the  concentration  of  the  entire  industry  into  fewer 
establishments  and  that  the  ownership  of  these  es- 
tablishments has  come  into  the  hands  of  a  smaller 
group  of  individuals. 

In  1904  the  average  investment  to  each  proprietor 
or  firm  member  in  the  liquor  industry,  according  to 
the  Statistical  Abstract  of  the  United  States,  was 
$282,432,  whereas  in  1909  each  proprietor  or  firm 
member  had  an  investment  in  the  business  of  $536,- 
520,  an  increase  of  89.9  per  cent.  In  all  industries 
in  the  United  States  the  investment  for  each  pro- 
prietor or  firm  member  in  1904  was  $56,160,  and 
in  1909  it  was  $67,430,  or  an  increase  of  only  19.6 
per  cent. 

Meanwhile,  as  the  liquor  industry  was  being  con- 
centrated into  fewer  hands,  each  one  of  whom  was 
becoming  enormously  rich,  the  relative  number  of 


106  Why  Prohibition! 

wage-earners  employed  for  the  increasing  amount  of 
capital  invested  was  decreased.  While  the  increase 
in  the  amount  of  capital  invested  was  32.2  per  cent., 
the  increase  in  the  number  of  wage-earners  employed 
in  the  liquor  industry  was  only  13.5  per  cent,  and 
the  total  increase  in  the  amount  of  money  spent  in 
wages  was  only  18.4  per  cent. 

No  wonder  the  liquor  men  are  delighted  to  have 
workingmen  use  their  labour  unions  to  fight  their 
battles.  It's  all  to  the  good  for  the  liquor  men, 
while  at  the  same  time  it's  all  to  the  bad  for  labour. 
The  stronger  the  liquor  industry  becomes  the  less 
there  is  in  it  for  the  workingman — fewer  jobs,  and 
less  money  for  wages — but  there  are  bigger  blocks 
of  stock  and  bigger  dividends  for  the  bosses. 
Strange  that  the  average  workingman  doesn't  "get 
wise"  to  these  facts. 

When  workingmen  defend  the  liquor  industry 
above  all  other  industries  they  should  remember 
that  the  men  in  control  of  this  industry  are  among 
the  worst  monopolists  in  America.  It  can  at  least 
be  said  in  behalf  of  practically  all  other  monopolies 
that  their  products  are  beneficial  to  mankind, 
whereas  the  products  of  the  liquor  industry  are  in- 
jurious to  mankind. 

The  liquor  industry  takes  useful  raw  materials  and 
converts  them  into  a  worse  than  useless  commodity, 
consuming  an  immense  amount  of  energy,  while  the 
average  industry  takes  practically  useless  raw  mate- 


Workingmen  and  the  Saloon    107 

rials  and  converts  them  into  highly  useful  products, 
at  a  comparatively  small  expenditure  of  energy. 

Scarcely  any  of  the  raw  materials  which  go  into 
the  manufacture  of  beer,  wine  and  whiskey  but  what 
might  be  used  to  increase  life  and  health. 

Nature  made  these  materials  into  food,  but  the 
liquor  men  convert  them  into  poison.  Instead  of  be- 
ing a  blessing  to  mankind,  they  cause  death  and  deg- 
radation when  the  liquor  men  are  through  with 
them. 

And  the  curious  thing  is  that  it  requires  more  cap- 
ital to  produce  these  poisons  than  is  required  to  pro- 
duce some  of  the  most  useful  articles  which  minister 
to  the  comfort  of  the  people, — four  times  as  much, 
according  to  the  census  figures. 

Men  take  trees  from  the  virgin  forests,  ores  from 
the  heart  of  the  earth,  stone  from  their  quarries — > 
all  of  which  in  their  natural  state  are  practically  use- 
less— and  through  their  energy  and  ingenuity  they 
build  cities,  houses  and  homes. 

They  take  the  waste  materials  of  industry  and 
build  out  of  them  fame  and  fortune  for  themselves, 
and  for  the  people  they  create  the  very  necessities 
of  life — whereas  the  liquor  men  consume  the  choicest 
materials — God-grown — and  leave  in  their  wake 
distress  and  death. 

When  Gustave  Pabst — then  president  of  the 
United  States  Brewers'  Association  and  himself  a 
large  brewer — became  an  exponent  of  the  rights  of 


io8  Why  Prohibition! 

workingmen,  the  brewery  workmen  said:  "Good 
stuff — now  we'll  get  what's  coming  to  us !" 

For  Mr.  Pabst  had  said  that  "in  the  light  of  mod- 
ern sociology  and  economics  we  know  positively  that 
drink  is  not  responsible  for  all  the  evils  of  life;  to 
the  contrary  we  see  that  the  drink  evil — the  abuse 
of  alcoholic  beverages — is  to  a  very  large  degree 
a  product  of  modern  industrial  methods.  We  are 
living  at  a  high  speed.  In  every  department  of  life 
the  cry  is  'Speed,  speed,  and  yet  greater  speed !'  The 
easy-going  life  of  our  forefathers  has  departed  ap- 
parently forever.  Let  us  put  the  blame  mainly 
where  it  belongs — let  us  put  it  on  the  'system.' ' 

Sounds  like  a  "regular"  Socialist! 

So  it's  the  system  that  makes  a  man  drink  to  ex- 
cess? It's  the  demand  for  "speed"? 

But  hold  on — how  many  glasses  of  "alcoholic  bev- 
erages" does  the  average  brewery  workman  indulge 
in  daily?  Let  the  Brewers'  President  tell  us — he 
knows.  Ten?  Twenty?  Thirty?  What's  the  limit 
that  the  brewery  bosses  have  placed  upon  their  em- 
ployes in  this  respect? 

But  all  this  is  also  to  be  changed — according  to 
the  Brewers'  Journal. 

"Diseases  among  brewery  workers  have  been 
greatly  decreased  by  the  introduction  of  machinery, 
which  prevents  the  men  from  working  too  hard  and 
lessens  their  thirst,"  says  the  editor. 

But  everybody  has  been  taught  that  brewery  work- 
ers were  always  among  the  healthiest  workmen ! 


Workingmen  and  the  Saloon     109 

They  LOOK  so  healthy — so  robust,  so  rotund,  so 
rosy!  But  life  insurance  experts  have  been  telling 
us  that  brewery  workers  die  sooner  than  most  work- 
ers, in  spite  xof  their  apparently  healthy  condition. 
And  they  ought  to  know. 

And  now  the  brewery  workers  will  not  be  com- 
pelled to  work  "too  hard"  I  This  will  "lessen  their 
thirst!" 

One  would  think  that  heretofore  the  brewery 
workers  were  having  rather  a  rough  time  of  it — = 
working  so  hard  that  they  were  driven  to  drink ! 

What  a  blessed  thing  is  machinery!  And  won't 
it  be  a  great  thing  when  other  workers  will  have 
disease  and  death-rates  "greatly  reduced"  because 
they  have  cut  out  booze, — just  like  the  brewery  work- 
ers. For  if  it's  a  good  thing  for  brewery  workers 
to  get  away  from  the  ill  effects  of  consuming  their 
own  product,  it  should  also  be  a  good  thing  for 
the  average  worker!  Why  not? 

And  yet  the  saloon  is  being  offered  by  the  pub- 
licity man  of  the  liquor  industry  as  a  cure  for  indus- 
trial ills! 

After  picturing  the  sordid  conditions  of  industrial 
workers,  pointing  out  the  struggles  which  these  work- 
ers are  making  to  find  escape  from  their  dreadful 
conditions,  this  statement  is  offered:  "You  have 
made  your  fight  on  stimulants,  and,  like  thousands 
of  others,  you  have  turned  to  the  saloon  as  the  only 
friend  of  the  physical  down-and-out." 

Many  workingmen  are  undoubtedly  suffering  most 


no  Why  Prohibition! 

grievously  on  account  of  unjust  economic  conditions 
and  because  their  work  is  unhealthy  in  its  character 
and  because  their  surroundings  are  bad.  But  the 
conditions  described  by  the  publicity  man,  and  which 
booze  is  supposed  to  have  healed,  read  very  much 
like  those  conditions  for  which  tooze,  itself,  is  re- 
sponsible. 

Look  at  a  few  of  his  interesting  paragraphs  : 

"Have  you  felt  your  tongue  thicken  and  your  throat 
parch  ?  Thousands  who  drink,  drink  not  because  they  want 
to,  but  because  they  must." 

Doesn't  this  sound  like  the  cravings  of  a  confirmed 
drunkard? 

"Have  you  ever  been  tired  with  a  fatigue  that  finds  you 
heavy-hearted  in  the  morning,  and  dogs  your  footsteps  each 
succeeding  day;  that  week  by  week  benumbs  your  power  of 
recuperation  ?" 

But  here's  a  still  more  graphic  picture  of  the 
"morning  after" — 

"Have  you  dragged  your  poisoned  body  to  the  daily  task 
with  only  the  loathing  memory  of  your  untouched  breakfast 
for  sustenance?" 

Still  he  goes  on: 

"Have  you  felt  your  strength  slip  from  you  hour  by  hour; 
have  you  fought  with  palsied  muscles  to  hold  your  job  and 
to  keep  yourself  and  your  family  off  the  street?" 


Workingmen  and  the  Saloon     in 

Nobody  knows  quite  so  well  as  the  workingman 
that  booze  does  all  this  and  much  more. 

No  wonder  that  the  liquor  industry's  publicity 
agent  asks  in  despair: 

"Why  do  many  workers  vote  the  Prohibition  ticket,  and 
for  the  enactment  of  Prohibition  laws?  Why  do  they  vote 
for  their  enslavement  by  a  set  of  fanatics  who  never  earned 
in  all  their  lives  one  penny  by  hard  work  in  a  mill  or  fac- 
tory? Are  the  laws  of  God  against  intemperance  no  longer 
sufficient?  Had  not  many  workers  voted  for  Prohibition 
there  would  be  no  dry  territory  in  our  country." 

Why  does  the  workingman  vote  against  the  sa- 
loon? Because  he  has  seen  the  folly  of  being  "dizzy, 
heavy-footed  with  pounding  arteries  and  heavy- 
handed,"  which  is  another  picture  presented  by  the 
questioner  in  his  illuminating  article. 

Why  does  the  workingman  vote  against  the  sa- 
loon? Because  he  is  tired  of  its  effects  the  morning 
after — because  he  sees  that  the  whole  business  is 
a  delusion  and  a  snare,  and  that  while  the  saloon 
may  temporarily  dull  his  brain  and  make  him  stupid, 
so  that  he  forgets  the  horrors  of  our  industrial  sys- 
tem, he  only  awakens  to  it  when  he  sobers  up  with 
an  extreme  contempt  for  himself,  realising  that  booze 
merely  made  him  less  fit  for  the  fight  to  get  rid  of 
these  industrial  conditions. 

This  is  why  the  workingman  is  coming  more  and 
more  to  vote  against  the  saloon — no  matter  how 
much  it  may  grieve  the  inventor  of  the  plausible  ar- 


112  Why  Prohibition! 

guments  for  the  maintenance  of  the  liquor  industry. 

The  saloonkeeper  always  gives  preference  to  the 
bartender  who  doesn't  drink.  If  drinking  whiskey 
is  bad  for  the  man  behind  the  bar,  why  isn't  it 
equally  bad  for  the  man  before  the  bar? 

The  advocates  of  the  saloon  inform  us  that  the 
saloon  is  "the  poor  man's  club" — that  if  he  doesn't 
go  to  the  saloon,  he  can't  go  anywhere  else.  Well 
— there's  his  home.  His  wife  is  compelled  to  remain 
there  in  spite  of  its  inconveniences.  Often  the  "poor 
man's  club" — the  saloon — is  used  to  beat  his  wife 
with — and  that's  all  she  gets  out  of  it. 

Now  the  workingman  is  up  against  a  good  many 
difficult  problems.  His  home  isn't  all  that  it  should 
be.  He  doesn't  have  all  the  joy  that  he  deserves 
and  needs.  But  when  he  puts  his  home  and  his  joys 
into  the  hands  of  the  saloon  interests,  then  it's  "good 
night"  to  the  best  things  in  human  life. 

(The  saloon,  as  an  institution,  does  more  to  dis- 
courage progress  among  workingmen  than  any  other 
agency  in  this  country.  When  it  serves  liquor  to 
a  workingman  it  has  a  tendency  to  make  that  work- 
ingman too  easily  contented  with  his  lot." 

It  isn't  the  man  who  drinks  who  produces  pros- 
perity; it's  the  man  who  doesn't  drink.  The  work- 
ingman who  drinks  has  low  ideals  for  himself  arid 
for  his  class.  The  man  who  spends  his  money  for 
the  satisfaction  of  higher  ideals  in  life  creates  a  de- 
mand for  commodities  which  not  only  have  perma- 
nent value,  but  which  give  employment  to  a  larger 


Workingmen  and  the  Saloon     113 

number  of  people  than  if  his  desires  ended  merely 
in  the  drinking  of  booze. 

There  is  no  greater  hindrance  to  the  labour  move- 
ment than  the  ''satisfied"  man.  The  non-saloon 
patronising  man  is  a  greater  asset  to  the  labour  move- 
ment than  the  man  who  spends  all  the  time  that  he 
can  in  the  saloon.  This  is  the  opinion  of  the  best 
labour  leaders  the  world  over. 

The  reason  for  this  is  that  the  total  abstainer  is 
not  only  clear-headed,  seeing  the  injustices  in  the  in- 
dustrial world,  but  he  makes  a  better  fighter  than  the 
booze-soaked  worker,  whose  horizon  is  bounded  by 
the  rim  of  a  glass  of  beer. 

Discussing  the  relation  of  the  labour  union  to  mem- 
bers who  are  discharged  for  using  booze,  the  Union 
Leader,  the  official  organ  of  the  Electric  Railway 
Employes  of  Chicago,  recently  said: 

"All  sensible  men  in  this  age  realise  that  booze  and  busi- 
ness will  not  mix  and  that  strict  attention  to  duty  and  abso- 
lute honesty  is  essential  to  success.  The  trainman  who 
forms  the  habit  of  drinking  booze  on  duty  is  in  a  measure 
to  be  pitied,  for  he  is  giving  away  to  a  weakness  that  must 
eventually  destroy  his  usefulness.  In  any  event,  it  must  be 
admitted  that  the  man  who  follows  the  practice  of  drinking 
intoxicating  liquors  on  duty  is  dangerous  in  the  street  rail- 
way occupation.  He  is  not  only  jeopardising  the  public  and 
company,  but  himself  and  fellow-workmen. 

"The  organisation  cannot  be  expected  to  keep  men  in 
positions  who  refuse  to  play  square.  When  men  accept  po- 
sitions in  the  street  railway  service  they  do  so  with  an  un- 


114  Why  Prohibition! 

derstanding  of  what  is  expected  of  them.  If  they  choose 
to  drink  on  duty  and  fail  to  register  fares  they  are  doing 
these  things  of  their  own  volition,  and  when  they  get  caught 
and  suspension  follows  they  should  be  men  enough  to  take 
their  medicine  without  coming  to  the  organisation  with  a 
complaint.  Certainly  the  organisation  did  not  instruct  them 
to  drink  on  duty,  pilfer  fares  or  become  careless.  The  teach- 
ings of  the  organisation  are  against  these  practices,  so  that 
when  disaster  follows  such  acts  the  guilty  have  no  one  but 
themselves  to  blame. 

"The  line  of  resistance  in  the  street  railway  business  is 
to  shun  booze  on  duty,  practice  courtesy,  follow  the  rules 
as  nearly  as  possible,  try  to  do  the  right  thing  at  all  times 
and  under  all  circumstances  register  fares  as  you  get  them. 

"Jag  Joy  and  Jit  Juggling  will  place  your  job  in  jeopardy. 
If  you  are  a  victim  of  these  habits,  get  right  or  get  off  the 
job  before  they  get  you  with  a  record." 

Booze  is  not  only  a  waste  in  itself,  but  it  wastes 
the  resources  of  the  worker  as  well  as  of  the  boss. 

Other  things  being  equal,  a  dry  town  can  put  a 
wet  town  out  of  business  from  the  industrial  stand- 
point. The  actual  cost  of  living  is  always  increased 
by  the  drink  habit. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  the  use  of  intoxicating 
liquor  by  the  worker  reduces  his  wages.  This  at 
the  same  time  reduces  the  margin  of  profit  of  the 
boss,  because  his  overhead  and  other  general  charges 
are  the  same,  no  matter  how  much  he  pays  for  wages. 
Therefore,  when  the  workingman  is  at  a  low  state 
of  efficiency  it  greatly  increases  the  cost  of  the  out- 


Workingmen  and  the  Saloon     115 

put,  and  hence  increases  the  selling  cost  of  the 
product. 

On  the  other  hand,  when  the  worker  abstains  from 
the  use  of  alcohol,  thereby  increasing  his  efficiency, 
he  advances  his  own  wage  rate  and  increases  the 
profit  of  the  boss,  which  enables  the  boss  to  sell  at 
a  narrower  margin  of  profit. 

It  may  be  put  down  as  a  general  principle  that, 
other  things  being  equal,  whatever  increases  the  effi- 
ciency of  the  worker  cheapens  the  cost  of  the  product. 

The  boss  can  afford  to  pay  higher  wages  when 
workingmen  are  more  efficient,  because,  he  himself 
receives  more  profit  on  account  of  the  workingmen' s 
increased  efficiency. 

The  public  at  large  is  also  the  beneficiary  of  this 
increased  efficiency,  because  the  increased  production, 
due  to  the  workingman's  increased  efficiency,  should 
enable  the  producer  to  sell  his  product  more  cheaply. 

It  doesn't  matter  much  from  which  angle  one  ap- 
proaches the  liquor  problem — it  must  always  be 
apparent  that  the  use  of  liquor  always  reacts  against 
the  interest  of  the  men  and  the  boss. 

Therefore,  the  saloon,  which  increases  the  use 
of  strong  drink,  is  always  a  detriment  to  any  com- 
munity. Hence,  let's  put  the  saloon  out  of  business, 
and  increase  the  general  prosperity  of  the  working- 
man,  the  boss  and  the  public. 

We've  been  told  that  when  a  town  goes  dry,  work- 
ingmen throw  up  their  jobs. 

In  order  to  test  out  this  matter  telegrams  were 


n6  Why  Prohibition! 

sent  by  the  dry  campaign  committee  in  Newburgh, 
New  York,  to  several  leading  shipbuilding  compan- 
ies, because  the  argument  had  been  made  by  the 
uwets"  that  ships  must  be  built  to  win  the  war  and 
to  build  ships  quickly  requires  contented  working- 
men  and  they  had  persuaded  some  employers  of  la- 
bour in  town  that  if  the  saloons  were  closed  work- 
ers would  leave. 

Here  are  some  answers  straight  from  big  ship- 
building companies: 

"We  have  no  difficulty  securing  men  and  are  very  much 
in  favour  of  prohibition." 

MCDOUGALL-DULUTH   SHIPBUILDING  COMPANY, 

Duluth,  Minn. 

"Prohibition  has  not  affected  our  business  in  any  way 
adversely.  We  think  men  are  altogether  more  reliable 
and  industrious.  They  have  more  interest  in  the  work  and 
more  ambition  to  succeed." 

PACIFIC  LIFEBOAT  COMPANY, 

Portland,  Ore. 

"Prohibition  increases  the  efficiency  and  dependability  of 
labour  and  does  not  affect  the  procuring  of  it." 
FRED  D.  DOTY,  President, 
NATIONAL  CONCRETE  BOAT  COMPANY, 

Norfolk,  Va. 

"Prohibition  affects  this  company  favourably  rather  than 
otherwise.     We  do  not  have  any  trouble  securing  capable 
mechanics  because  of  prohibition." 
NEWPORT  NEWS  SHIPBUILDING  AND  DRY  DOCK  Co., 

Newport  News,   Va. 


Workingmen  and  the  Saloon     117 

And  here's  a  telegram  from  the  man  who  is  su- 
premely interested  in  building  ships  to  win  the  war : 

The  Secretary  of  the  Navy 

Washington 

"Replying  to  your  telegram  I  would  say  that  the  ex- 
periment has  been  made  and  the  removal  of  the  saloon  is 
an  advantage  in  every  way  both  to  industries  and  to  the 
home." 

Sincerely  yours, 

JOSEPH  us  DANIELS. 


VII 

Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon 

ORGANISED  labour's  next  big  fight  will  not  be 
against  the  capitalists  nor  against  the  socialists- 
its  old-time  opponents.  The  next  great  conflict  of 
organised  labour  will  be  within  its  own  ranks — it  will 
be  between  the  forces  representing  the  liquor  inter- 
ests and  those  who  are  opposed  to  the  saloon  and  its 
influence  within  the  labour  movement.  No  one  re- 
alises this  more  keenly  than  the  craftsmen  who  are 
engaged  in  the  various  forms  of  the  liquor  business 
and  its  allied  industries,  and  they  are  preparing  to 
meet  what  they  believe  to  be  the  most  important  bat- 
tle in  their  history. 

The  two  leading  international  labour  unions 
which  are  most  directly  interested  in  perpetuating 
the  liquor  business  are  the  Bartenders'  League  of 
America  and  the  International  Union  of  Brewery 
Workmen.  These  organisations  are  not  only  striv- 
ing to  secure  "one  hundred  per  cent."  unions — that 
is,  not  only  are  they  determined  to  have  every  man 
working  in  saloons  and  in  and  about  breweries  be- 
come members  of  these  unions,  but  they  are  fighting 
even  more  vigorously  to  line  up  the  labour  forces 

118 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    119 

in  a  national  attack  upon  the  "dry"  movement  of  this 
country.  And  their  success  in  this  direction  should 
give  pause  to  over-confident  prohibitionists.  Both 
the  Bartenders'  and  the  Brewery  Workers'  Unions 
are  affiliated  with  the  American  Federation  of  La- 
bor, and  of  the  114  national  and  international  unions 
affiliated  with  the  Federation,  the  Bartenders  stand 
sixth  in  point  of  membership,  and  the  Brewery 
Workers  tenth. 

However,  there  are  many  other  international 
unions  not  directly  engaged  in  the  manufacture  and 
sale  of  liquor  which  are  more  or  less  identified  in 
their  interests  with  the  Brewery  Workers'  and  Bar- 
tenders' Unions.  For  example,  the  Cigar  Makers7 
Union  is  interested  because,  they  say,  practically  all 
union  made  cigars  are  sold  in  saloons.  Hence  they 
sincerely  believe  that  if  the  saloons  are  closed  their 
union  will  be  destroyed.  Many  members  in  the 
Coopers'  Union,  which  furnishes  the  barrels  for  the 
liquor  industry,  the  Glass  Bottle  Blowers'  Union, 
which  makes  bottles  and  glasses  for  saloons  and 
breweries,  the  Wood  Workers'  Union,  which  fur- 
nishes the  fixtures  for  saloons,  the  union  men  who 
manufacture  beer  pumps  and  bottle  machinery,  the 
men  who  make  automobiles  in  which  the  beer  is 
transported  to  the  saloon,  and  many  other  groups 
of  workingmen  sincerely  believe  that  their  destiny 
is  tied  up  with  the  liquor  interests.  The  liquor  men 
have  tabulated  a  list  of  77  trades  and  occupations 
which  they  insist  will  be  affected  by  the  abolition  of 


I2O  Why  Prohibition! 

the  saloon.  And  it  is  declared  that  in  the  line-up 
which  will  shortly  take  place  the  great  majority  of 
workingmen  who  are  identified  with  these  industries 
will  fight  on  the  side  of  the  saloon,  even  though 
they,  themselves,  may  be  total  abstainers. 

So  fearful  of  the  results  of  prohibition  has  the 
Coopers'  Union  apparently  become  that  at  a  recent 
annual  convention  of  their  organisation  they  adopted 
a  resolution  requesting  the  American  Federation  of 
Labor  to  appoint  a  Commission  composed  of  repre- 
sentatives of  organised  labour  for  the  purpose  of 
fighting  the  dry  movement  in  every  part  of  this  coun- 
try. Had  this  resolution  been  adopted  by  the  Fed- 
eration, it  would  immediately  have  resulted  in  a 
split  in  the  American  Labour  Movement,  for  it  would 
have  meant  that  substantially  every  trade  unionist 
affiliated  with  the  Federation  would  be  compelled 
to  financially  support  such  a  movement.  And  many 
trade  unionists  would  have  protested  against  such 
action  by  the  Federation.  Fortunately,  the  resolu- 
tion was  not  even  introduced  at  the  convention  of 
the  American  Federation  of  Labor. 

Another  indication  of  the  growing  conflict  in  the 
labour  movement  is  the  formation  of  the  "Trade 
Union  Personal  Liberty  Leagues,"  whose  chief  em- 
phasis is  not  so  much  upon  the  economic  aspects  of 
the  liquor  problem,  as  upon  "personal  liberty."  A 
regularly  organised  movement  is  on  foot  to  cap- 
ture State  Federations  of  Labor  for  the  liquor  busi- 
ness, the  liquor  men  often  agreeing  to  pay  the  bills 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    121 

of  delegates  to  be  sent  by  Central  Labor  Unions 
and  other  labour  bodies  which  otherwise  might  not 
send  delegates  because  of  the  expense.  The  printed 
constitution  of  the  Bartenders*  Union  specifically  in- 
structs representatives  of  this  organisation  to  get  to- 
gether on  the  day  previous  to  regular  labour  con- 
ventions at  which  they  might  be  delegates  for  the 
purpose  of  organising  to  push  their  propaganda  at 
the  sessions  of  the  convention.  This  movement 
among  the  liquor-dominated  trades  has  back  of  it 
some  of  the  brainiest  and  most  aggressive  labour 
leaders  in  America.  Incidentally  it  has  the  support 
of  the  employers,  themselves,  and  of  their  "special- 
ists" who  are  engaged  in  setting  up  campaigns  against 
the  "drys."  In  some  states  the  Liquor  Dealers'  Pro- 
tective League  and  the  State  Federations  of  Labor 
are  working  in  co-operation. 

The  liquor  interests  in  the  labour  movement  prac- 
tically control  the  Trade  Union  Label  Department 
of  the  American  Federation  of  Labor.  At  the  Phil- 
adelphia Convention  of  the  Federation  this  Depart- 
ment adopted  a  strong  resolution  against  prohibition 
in  all  its  forms.  It  was  made  to  appear  in  many 
daily  newspapers  that  the  Federation,  itself,  had 
adopted  the  resolution.  But  the  resolution  was  not 
even  considered  by  the  Federation.  At  the  San  Fran- 
cisco Convention  of  the  Federation,  the  representa- 
tive of  the  Brewery  Workers'  Union  became  bolder 
than  ever.  He  stated  at  the  meeting  of  the  Trade 
Union  Label  League  Department  that  the  time  had 


122  Why  Prohibition! 

come  when  every  international  union  must  declare 
itself  plainly  with  regard  to  prohibition) — "Either 
you  are  for  us  or  you  are  against  us ;  there  is  no  half- 
way ground,"  he  told  the  delegates,  and  at  this  con- 
ference another  resolution  against  prohibition  was 
adopted  by  practically  a  unanimous  vote.  It  should 
be  understood,  however,  that  the  action  of  the  Trade 
Union  Label  Department  was  not  endorsed  at  the 
regular  Convention  of  the  American  Federation  of 
Labor  in  either  case. 

What  a  farce  it  is  for  trade  unionists  to  vote  in 
favour  of  the  liquor  business — just  because  some 
beer-barrels  and  beer-bottles  contain  union  labels ! 

Organised  labour  is  prepared  to  say  that  goods 
containing  the  union  label  are  made  under  circum- 
stances which  free  the  worker  from  the  curse  of 
bad  economic  conditions. 

Why  should  it  not  also  guarantee  that  no  user  of 
these  union  labelled  goods  will  be  afflicted  by  the 
very  curse  from  which  labour  itself  seeks  freedom 
merely  through  their  use  ? 

We  are  informed  that  all  men  should  demand 
union  label  goods,  because,  among  other  things,  it 
means  the  prevention  of  tuberculosis.  But  every 
scientist,  and  every  physician  who  is  perfectly  hon- 
est, will  tell  you  that  booze  is  responsible  for  tu- 
berculosis. The  fact  that  the  Brewery  Workers' 
Union  label  is  on  the  barrel  or  on  the  bottle  doesn't 
make  a 'man  or  woman  immune  from  the  effects  of 
the  booze  which  they  contain ! 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    123 

We  are  informed  that  the  union  label  stands  for 
living  wages  and  a  shorter  work-day.  But  all  the 
tendencies  of  union  labelled  booze  is  to  lower  a 
man's  wages  and  lengthen  his  hours  of  labour. 

We  are  informed  that  the  union  label  stands  for 
the  prevention  of  child  labour.  But  union  labelled 
booze  sends  little  children  into  the  factory  and  de- 
prives them  of  the  best  things  in  human  life. 

We  are  informed  that  the  union  label  represents 
sanitary  workshops.  But  union  labelled  booze  never 
helped  a  man  get  a  job  in  a  high  grade  shop  where 
the  best  standards  are  maintained. 

There  are  many  other  commendable  things  for 
which  the  union  stands,  and  workingmen  should  be 
encouraged  in  the  most  practical  fashion  to  secure 
these  ends. 

But  why  should  organised  labour  tie  itself  up  to 
a  business  which  does  more  to  undermine  the  fine, 
big  principles  for  which  it  stands  and  the  practical 
things  for  which  it  is  contending,  than  all  the  union 
labels  in  the  country  can  help  it  secure? 

Meanwhile  the  "drys"  in  the  labour  movement  are 
also  organising.  In  Ohio  there  is  what  is  known 
as  the  "Workingman's  Protective  and  Publicity  As- 
sociation." And  in  Nebraska  the  "Anti-booze 
League,"  composed  exclusively  of  trade  unionists, 
has  been  formed.  The  object  of  the  league  is  set 
forth  in  the  following  statement: 

"The  object  of  this  league  is  to  impress  upon  the  general 
public  that  certain  'labour  organisations'  and  'trades  union 


124  Why  Prohibition! 

liberty  leagues,'  controlled  by  the  liquor  interests,  do  not 
voice  the  true  sentiment  of  labour  organisations  of  Nebraska 
in  their  effort  to  make  it  appear  that  the  labouring  class  is 
subservient  to  the  whims  of  said  liquor  industry. 

"It  shall  be  the  aim  of  this  organisation  to  publicly  dis- 
claim in  every  way  possible  that  union  labour  of  Nebraska 
looks  upon  the  use  of  liquor  as  an  aid  to  its  welfare  and 
advancement;  but  rather  that  the  use  of  intoxicating  liquor 
is  the  greatest  handicap  union  labour  has  to  contend  with 
in  making  its  fight  for  justice  for  the  working  class. 

"The  members  of  this  league  resent  any  effort  of  the  liquor 
element  to  place  union  labour  of  Nebraska  in  the  attitude 
of  supporting  an  industry  that  never  has  and  never  can  aid 
the  workingman  in  his  struggle  for  better  conditions  for 
himself  and  family." 

Similar  organisations  are  being  formed  in  most  of 
the  industrial  states. 

During  the  Toronto  Convention  of  the  American 
Federation  of  Labor  an  immense  temperance  mass 
meeting  of  about  4,000  working  people  was  held  at 
Massey  Hall,  which  was  addressed  by  some  of  the 
most  prominent  labour  leaders  in  America  and  at 
which  the  writer  presided  and  at  which  time  clear- 
cut,  straightforward  arguments  were  presented 
against  the  entire  liquor  business.  Following  are 
some  quotations  from  the  speakers : 

"Poverty  has  driven  many  a  strong  man  to  drink,  and 
drink  has  driven  many  a  strong  man  to  poverty,"  said  John 
Mitchell,  in  arguing  that  the  liquor  traffic  was  the  enemy 
of  trade  unionism.  "I  am  not  at  all  impressed  with  the 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    125 

argument  that  if  you  close  down  the  liquor  traffic  you  bring 
about  a  calamity.  When  you  shut  down  a  distillery,  a  fac- 
tory takes  its  place;  and  when  you  close  up  a  saloon,  a 
grocery  store  is  put  in.  No  man  has  a  right  to  spend  a 
cent  upon  himself  until  he  has  first  provided  for  his  fam- 
ily. But  the  average  workingman  does  not  yet  earn  enough 
to  give  his  family  all  the  comforts  they  deserve.  He  has 
no  money  to  spend  on  drink  without  robbing  his  family." 

John  B.  Lennon,  at  that  time  Treasurer  of  the  American 
Federation  of  Labor,  said:  "What  is  the  effect  of  the 
liquor  traffic  on  the  standard  of  living  of  the  people?  Is 
there  any  influence  gone  out  from  the  saloon  that  has 
helped  to  make  men  and  women  better?  The  labour  move- 
ment is  essentially  a  moral  movement.  It  stands  for  equal 
opportunity  for  men  and  women,  though  it  believes  that  it 
should  be  made  more  easily  possible  for  women  to  become 
homemakers.  Who  can  deny  that  the  liquor  traffic  is  driv- 
ing women  to  work  in  factories,  in  workshops  and  at  wash- 
tubs  who  ought  not  to  be  there?  Every  cent  spent  in  the 
liquor  business  is  wasted.  It  brings  no  social  benefit  and 
no  moral  uplift.  To  the  trade  unionist  there  is  no  redeem- 
ing feature  in  the  saloon.  Go  anywhere  where  its  influence 
is  felt  and  you  see  the  demoralisation  it  brings.  We  are 
fighting  for  social  well-being,  civic  benefits,  and  moral  up- 
lift. Never  a  foul  plot  is  organised  to  injure  public  rights 
and  social  well-being  but  the  saloon  is  used  for  the  job. 
The  saloon  is  the  enemy  of  the  people  for  whom  we  work." 

"If  you  want  to  know  where  the  miners  of  America 
stand  upon  the  temperance  question  I'll  tell  you,"  said  Tom 
L.  Lewis,  then  President  of  the  United  Mine  Workers.  "In 
our  constitution  we  have  a  clause  which  forbids  any  mem- 
ber to  sell  intoxicants  even  at  a  picnic.  That's  what  we 


126  Why  Prohibition! 

think  of  the  liquor  traffic.  Some  people  say  that  the  sa- 
loon is  a  necessary  evil.  I  don't  believe  in  that  kind  of 
doctrine.  Because  the  liquor  traffic  tends  to  enslave  the 
people,  to  make  them  satisfied  with  improper  conditions 
and  keeps  them  ignorant,  the  leaders  of  the  trades  union 
movement  are  called  on  to  fight  the  saloon." 

The  effect  of  this  great  meeting  of  workingmen 
and  women  in  protest  against  saloon  dominance  was 
marked,  and  it  brought  forth  hundreds  of  editorials 
and  articles  not  only  in  the  labour  press  but  in  daily 
newspapers  as  well. 

Here,  for  example,  is  an  editorial  printed  in  the 
New  York  Evening  Mall.  After  quoting  from  the 
addresses,  the  editorial  continued: 

"Expressions  like  these  from  conspicuous  leaders  of  the 
American  Federation  of  Labor  mean  that  the  attitude  of 
that  body  toward  the  saloon  is  about  to  change. 

"Why  should  it  not  change?  What  worthy  thing  has 
the  saloon  ever  done  for  labour,  union  or  non-union  ?  True, 
it  has  been  a  breeding  place  for  the  mob  spirit  and  con- 
spiracy among  the  ignorant  and  reckless,  but  what  has  it 
added  to  the  dignity  or  the  moral  influence  of  labour  unions  ? 

"What  has  the  saloon  done  for  the  striker  except  to  take 
his  money  for  bad  liquor  and  worse  advice?  What  has  it 
given  toward  the  support  of  his  wife  and  children  during 
his  idleness? 

"How  long  is  the  saloon  hospitable  to  the  workingman 
after  his  money  has  given  out?  What  real  interest  does 
it  show  in  his  welfare  after  he  ceases  to  be  a  paying  cus- 
tomer? 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    127 

"Has  a  labour  union  ever  gained  strength,  either  financial 
or  moral,  by  establishing  its  headquarters  in  a  saloon?  Is 
an  appeal  for  sympathy  or  assistance  the  more  effective  for 
being  issued  from  a  saloon? 

"These  questions  have  challenged  and  are  receiving  the 
attention  of  responsible  leaders  of  the  American  Federation 
of  Labor,  for  they  involve  the  influence,  if  not  the  very  ext 
istence,  of  that  great  organisation.  It  is  difficult  to  con» 
ceive  of  any  policy  through  which  it  might  gain  so  greatly 
in  prestige  and  public  respect  as  by  courageously  arraying 
itself  in  open  opposition  to  the  saloon  interest." 

One  of  the  most  important  battle  grounds  of  the 
"dry"  and  the  "wet"  forces  in  the  labour  movement 
is  in  the  Central  Labor  Union — the  local  organisa-. 
tion  which  is  composed  of  representatives  from  all 
the  various  unions  in  the  city  or  other  local  districts. 
Naturally  when  thirty  different  labour  unions,  for 
example,  are  represented  in  a  Central  Labor  Union 
the  Brewery  Workmen  and  the  Bartenders  have  a 
comparatively  small  body  present.  But  when  the 
representative  of  the  brewers  or  bartenders  intro- 
duces in  the  Central  Labor  Union  a  resolution  which 
is  based  upon  a  real  or  alleged  grievance  which  af- 
fects the  economic  interests  of  the  men  in  their 
organisation,  there  are  few  "dry"  delegates  who 
would  have  the  hardihood  to  oppose  such  a  resolu- 
tion. The  bartenders'  and  brewers'  delegates  insist 
that  as  trade  unionists  they  must  stand  together* 
against  their  common  foe — "the  capitalistic  class"; 
and  the  representatives  of  the  carpenters'  union,  the 


128  Why  Prohibition! 

friachinists'  union,  the  electricians'  union,  and  all 
others  who  are  affiliated  with  the  Central  Labor 
Union  believe  that  at  some  future  time  they  may 
have  occasion  to  make  a  somewhat  similar  request 
of  the  delegates  in  support  of  a  fight  against  their 
employers,  and  so  they  vote  in  favour  of  the  bar- 
tenders or  brewery  workers'  resolution,  no  matter 
how  strongly  they  may  oppose  the  liquor  business 
itself. 

This  situation  often  accounts  for  the  apparent 
sympathy  with  the  liquor  business  of  certain  labour 
bodies — when  all  that  was  involved  in  the  ques- 
tion at  issue  was  the  safeguarding  of  the  economic 
interests  of  wage-earners  engaged  in  some  form  of 
the  liquor  business.  But  there  is  no  doubt  that  soon 
there  will  be  strong  feeling  against  taking  such  ac- 
tion by  labour  bodies  composed  so  largely  of  oppo- 
nents of  the  liquor  business. 

It  is  a  well-known  fact  that  if  the  officer  of  an 
international  labour  union  comes  out  definitely 
against  the  liquor  business  and  talks  or  writes  in 
favour  of  the  "drys,"  all  the  forces  of  the  "wets"  in 
the  labour  movement  will  be  arrayed  against  him. 
This  has  naturally  made  many  of  the  leading  labour 
men  somewhat  timid  about  declaring  themselves  with 
regard  to  the  saloon  question.  For  with  most  of 
them  it  involves  their  living  and  practically  their 
future  as  labour  leaders.  There  is  not  as  yet  a 
sufficiently  strong  sentiment  among  the  rank  and  file 
of  the  national  trade  unions  in  favour  of  prohibition 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    129 

to  justify  a  national  officer  to  stand  for  prohibition, 
if  he  is  to  depend  upon  his  constituency  for  support. 

There  are  some  notable  exceptions  to  this  rule, 
and  many  of  the  national  unions  have  adopted  strong 
resolutions  against  drunkenness  and  against  holding 
labour  meetings  in  halls  connected  with  saloons,  but 
no  national  union — with  the  exception  of  railroad 
brotherhoods — has  come  out  in  favour  of  prohibi- 
tion as  such. 

A  study  of  the  Constitutions  of  over  one  hundred 
international  labour  unions  in  the  United  States  re- 
vealed the  fact  that  fully  one-half  of  them  have  taken 
some  action  regarding  the  liquor  question.  Many 
will  not  pay  sick  or  death  benefits  if  the  member 
was  killed  or  injured  while  intoxicated.  Others  have 
adopted  resolutions  forbidding  all  local  unions  from 
holding  their  meetings  in  places  controlled  by  saloons. 
A  very  considerable  number  suspend  or  expel  mem- 
bers who  enter  a  lodge  in  a  state  of  intoxication. 
In  many  cases  they  will  not  admit  a  man  who  is 
known  to  be  a  habitual  drinker  of  intoxicants.  Oth- 
ers will  not  admit  to  membership  men  who  are  en- 
gaged in  the  sale  of  intoxicating  liquors,  which  means 
that  if  a  member  of  a  particular  union  gives  up  his 
trade  and  enters  the  saloon  business,  he  is  not  per- 
mitted to  retain  his  membership  in  the  organisation. 
Some  unions  have  a  clause  in  their  contract  with 
employers  permitting  him  to  instantly  discharge  a 
man  for  drunkenness. 


130  Why  Prohibition! 

Following  are  some  typical  organisations  and  their 
rules  regarding  the  use  of  liquor: 

International  Fur  Workers'  Union. 

"Any  member  entering  the  meeting  in  a  state  of  intoxi- 
cation shall  be  admonished  by  the  President,  and  if  he  again 
offends  shall  be  excluded  from  the  room  and  fined,  sus- 
pended or  expelled  as  the  union  may  decide." 

Amalgamated  Association  of  Iron,  Steel  and  Tin  Workers. 
"No  benefit  paid  when  sickness  is  caused  by  intemperance. 
No  intoxicating  drinks  shall  be  permitted  to  be  served  when 
holding  a  business  meeting." 

Grand  International  Brotherhood  of  Locomotive  Engineers. 
"This  organisation  is  on  record  as  favouring  state  and 
nation  wide  prohibition.  The  following  resolution  was 
adopted  by  our  Convention  in  Cleveland,  Ohio,  in  May, 
1915:  'That  this  B.  of  L.  E.  go  on  record  as  favouring 
state  and  nation  wide  prohibition  of  intoxicating  liquor  as 
a  beverage.'  Our  laws  also  forbid  members  from  using 
intoxicating  liquors  as  a  beverage,  either  on  or  off  duty.  No 
claim  for  the  principal  sum  of  any  policy-holder  will  be 
recognised  when  loss  of  life  has  been  incurred  because  of 
intemperance." 

International  Association  of  Machinists. 

"Any  member  entering  the  lodge  while  under  the  influ- 
ence of  intoxicating  drinks,  or  who  has  been  guilty  of  using 
indecent  or  profane  language,  shall  be  reprimanded,  fined, 
suspended  or  expelled  at  the  option  of  the  lodge.  Habitual 
drunkenness  or  conduct  disgraceful  to  himself  or  associates, 
shall  be  punished  by  expulsion." 


• 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    131 


International   Brotherhood    of   Maintenance-of-Way    Em- 
ployes. 

"To  allow  no  person  to  remain  a  member  of  the  Broth- 
erhood unless  he  lives  a  sober,  moral  life.  Should  any 
member  know  that  any  other  member  has  conducted  him- 
self in  a  manner  calculated  to  bring  disgrace  upon  the 
Brotherhood,  or  of  being  guilty  of  drunkenness,  keeping  a 
saloon  where  intoxicating  liquors  are  sold,  it  shall  be  his 
duty  to  report  the  offending  party  to  the  officers  and  mem- 
bers of  the  Subordinate  Lodge.  No  benefit  paid  when 
sickness  is  the  result  of  intemperance." 

Brotherhood  of  Railroad  Trainmen. 

"Any  member  dealing  in,  or  in  any  way  connected  with 
the  sale  of  intoxicating  liquors,  shall,  unless  he  withdraws, 
be  expelled,  and  under  no  circumstances  shall  a  member  so 
expelled  be  readmitted  before  the  lapse  of  six  months.  A 
brother  convicted  of  drunkenness,  shall  for  the  first  offense 
be  reprimanded  or  suspended  for  thirty  days,  or  both,  as  the 
lodge  may  direct.  For  the  second  offense  he  shall  be  sus- 
pended not  less  than  thirty  days,  nor  more  than  two 
months.  No  benefit  paid  when  sickness  or  disability  re- 
sulted from  intemperance." 

International  Brotherhood  of  Teamsters,  Chauffeurs,  Stable- 
men and  Helpers. 

"The  majority  of  our  local  unions  pay  a  sick  and  death 
benefit,  and  it  is  specifically  stated  in  their  rules,  that  if  sick- 
ness is  caused  from  the  use  of  liquor  or  is  the  result  of  in- 
toxication, that  the  individual  will  not  be  entitled  to  sick 
benefits." 


132  Why  Prohibition! 

International   Brotherhood   of  Steam   Shovel   and   Dredge 

Men. 

"No  confirmed  drunkard,  incompetent,  disreputable  or 
dishonest  man  shall  be  eligible  to  membership.  Any  mem- 
ber who  has  been  recommended  to  a  position  by  this  Brother- 
hood and  gets  intoxicated  or  neglects  his  work,  will  forfeit 
the  privilege  of  asking  for  a  recommendation  to  any  position 
and  shall  be  liable  to  a  fine  or  suspension  from  the  Brother- 
hood." 

International  Seamen's  Union  of  America. 

"Any  member  who  through  bad  conduct  aboard  ship 
brings  the  union  into  illrepute  or  through  drink  may  cause 
the  delay  of  any  vessel,  shall  upon  proper  trial  and  convic- 
tion, be  fined  $5.00  for  the  first  offense;  for  the  second 
offense  he  shall  be  liable  to  be  expelled.  No  member  under 
the  influence  of  liquor  shall  be  admitted  to  any  meeting  and 
the  Chairman  shall  strictly  enforce  this  rule." 

Following  is  a  significant  set  of  resolutions  adopted 
by  the  Virginia  State  Federation  of  Labor,  by  a  vote 
of  78  in  favour  and  19  opposed,  which  indicates  that 
organised  labour  is  beginning  to  take  action  in  this 
matter: 

"WHEREAS:  The  subject  of  National  Prohibition  has 
become  of  national  importance  through  the  victories  of  pro- 
hibition in  the  large  number  of  dry  states ;  and, 

"WHEREAS:  We  believe  that  prohibition  has  improved 
the  condition  of  the  workers  in  Virginia  since  this  State  went 
dry;  and 

"WHEREAS:  It  is  advisable  that  the  Virginia  Federation 
of  Labor  take  a  stand  on  the  question ; 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    133 

"THEREFORE  :  Be  it  resolved  by  the  Virginia  Federation 
of  Labor  in  convention  assembled  that  this  convention  go  on 
record  in  favour  of  national  prohibition  of  the  liquor  traf- 
fic; and, 

"Resolved,  further;  That  we  particularly  urge  Congress, 
in  the  interest  of  conservation  of  the  grain  supply,  to  pass 
a  measure  providing  for  national  prohibition  during  the 
war;  and, 

"Resolved,  also,  That  copies  of  these  resolutions  be  sent 
to  the  Congressmen  and  Senators  from  Virginia  and  copies 
furnished  the  press." 

In  England  labour  leaders  have  formed  the  La- 
bour Officials'  Temperance  Fellowship,  whose  ob- 
ject is  "the  personal  practice  and  promotion  of  total 
abstinence,  and  the  removal  of  trades'  society  meet- 
ings from  licensed  premises." 

The  president  of  the  Fellowship  is  Arthur  Hender- 
son, M.P.,  who  has  also  served  for  many  years  as 
chairman  of  the  Labour  party  in  parliament. 
Among  those  who  have  served  as  members  of  the 
executive  committee  are  the  Rt.  Hon.  Thomas  Burt, 
M.P.,  a  member  of  the  privy  council;  the  Rt.  Hon. 
John  Burns,  M.P.,  a  member  of  the  cabinet;  Will 
Steadman,  M.P.,  secretary  of  the  British  Trades 
Union  Congress;  J.  Ramsay  MacDonald,  M.P.,  sec- 
retary of  the  Labour  party;  D.  J.  Shackleton,  M.P., 
chairman  of  the  Trades  Union  Congress,  and  Harry 
Gosling,  who  served  as  a  member  of  the  London 
county  council.  Prominent  among  the  vice-presi- 
dents were:  J.  Keir  Hardie,  M.P.,  Will  Crooks, 


134  Why  Prohibition  I 

M.P.,  L.C.C.,  Phillip  Snowden,  M.P.;  indeed,  prac- 
tically every  trade  unionist  who  is  elected  to  parlia- 
ment is  a  vice-president  of  the  Fellowship,  and  this 
means  that  nearly  every  trade  unionist  elected  to  par- 
liament is  a  total  abstainer. 

The  Fellowship  had  its  beginnings  in  Leeds  in 

1904,  during  a  session  of  the  British  Trades  Union 
Congress.    A  "tea-party"  was  held  by  invitation  of 
the  National  Temperance  League,  at  which  260  del- 
egates were  present.    Arthur  Henderson,  M.P.,  on 
behalf  of  his  colleagues,  who  had  been  considering 
the  matter,  made  the  suggestion  that  a  total  ab- 
stinence  society  be   established  in  connection  with 
labour.     During  the  following  year  many  officials 
in  the  trades  union  movement  manifested  their  in- 
terest in  the  proposed  society,  with  the  result  that 
at  the  Hanley  meeting  of  the  Trades  Congress  in. 

1905,  at  a  gathering  of  300  delegates,  the  "Temper- 
ance Fellowship"  was  launched.     Every  year  since 
its  organisation  the  Fellowship  has  given  a  tea  at 
the  time  of  the  annual  meeting  of  the  British  Trades 
Congress,  and  in  every  case  fully  half  of  the  dele- 
gates attending  have  been  present  and  manifested 
their  active  interest  in  the  aim  and  object  of  the 
Fellowship. 

At  the  last  meeting  of  the  congress  there  were 
present  270  delegates,  representative  of  a  body  of 
close  upon  1,000,000  workingmen.  The  influence 
of  this  organisation  upon  the  rank  and  file  of  the 
workers  has  been  quite  remarkable.  Temperance 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    135 

sentiment  has  been  rapidly  growing  among  the 
younger  men  in  the  labour  movement,  and  as  the 
secretary  of  the  General  Federation  of  Trades 
Unions  told  me,  "it  is  no  longer  considered  honour- 
able or  decent  for  a  labour  man  to  put  away  three 
bottles  of  porter." 

The  Fellowship  issues  considerable  literature  and 
sends  out  its  manifestoes  through  the  various  local 
labour  unions  and  the  labour  press.  When  the  "Na- 
tional Freedom  Defence  League,"  representing  the 
liquor  interests,  issued  a  statement  purporting  to  be 
in  the  interest  of  the  workers,  the  entire  commit- 
tee and  all  the  vice-presidents  got  out  a  counter  peti- 
tion, which  was  given  the  widest  publicity  through 
the  daily  press.  Labour's  statement  was  also  given 
additional  publicity  through  imprints  issued  by  many 
local  and  national  trade  unions.  These  publica- 
tions effectually  silenced  the  pretended  friends  of 
the  workingman. 

One  of  the  most  effective  methods  of  work  lies 
in  securing  meeting  places  for  local  trades  unions 
which  are  free  from  the  influence  of  the  saloon. 
A  successful  effort  has  been  made  to  secure  the  use 
of  public  buildings  controlled  by  local  governing 
bodies,  and  in  many  cases  churches  have  been  opened 
for  the  use  of  the  trade  unions. 

Samuel  Gompers,  president  of  the  American  Fed- 
eration of  Labor,  is  not  a  Prohibitionist,  but  for 
many  years  he  has  recognised  the  evil  influence  of 
the  saloon  upon  the  labour  movement. 


136  Why  Prohibition! 

In  several  of  his  annual  reports  he  has  called 
attention  to  this  subject.  Following  are  some  para- 
graphs from  three  different  reports: 

Minneapolis  Convention:  "It  is  not  only  the  aim,  but 
the  trend  of  our  movement  to  make  men  more  moderate 
and  temperate  regarding  the  use  of  intoxicants.  Through 
the  influence  of  our  movement  the  so-called  labour  bureaus, 
that  is,  the  places  where  unemployed  workmen  could  seek 
employment,  have  been  removed  from  the  drinking  saloon,  as 
has  also  the  place  of  payment  of  wages  been  removed  from 
that  influence.  Gradually,  but  constantly,  the  unions  have 
sought  meeting  places  in  buildings  in  which  intoxicants  are 
not  on  sale." 

San  Francisco  Convention:  "In  my  last  report  attention 
was  called  to  the  dearth  of  ample  and  satisfactory  meeting 
rooms  for  the  constantly  growing  organisations  of  the  work- 
ing people  of  our  country.  It  was  pointed  out  that  the 
tendency  of  our  union  men  is  to  have  their  meeting  places 
disconnected  from  the  saloons.  The  subject  is  again  com- 
mended to  your  favourable  consideration  so  that  it  may  be 
impressed  upon  our  fellow  workers  everywhere,  and  by 
them  made  a  public  demand,  that  our  public  schoolrooms, 
when  not  in  use  for  their  primary  purposes,  may  be  utilised 
for  this  good  cause.  Meetings  of  workmen  in  our  public 
schoolrooms  can  have  but  one  effect;  that  is,  the  improve- 
ment in  the  morale  of  all,  and  without  detriment  to  any." 

Pittsburg  Convention:  "There  is  a  constantly  growing 
desire  among  our  membership  to  hold  their  meetings  in  halls 
on  the  premises  of  which  there  is  no  sale  of  intoxicants.  In 
the  interests  of  sobriety  and  morality,  I  again  urge  that  this 
convention  strongly  recommend  to  our  affiliated  organisa- 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    137 

tions  throughout  the  country  that  they  inaugurate  a  move- 
ment which  shall  permit  the  use  of  our  public  schoolrooms 
for  the  evening  meetings  of  our  labour  organisations." 

Great  Britain  reduced  the  amount  of  liquor  that 
might  be  produced  during  the  war — but  recently  in- 
creased the  quantity,  because,  it  was  alleged,  the 
workingmen  wanted  more  booze. 

The  result  was  that  the  leaders  of  labour  pro- 
tested against  this  excuse  for  pleasing  brewers  rather 
than  workingmen. 

In  Clydebank,  close  to  Glasgow — a  thoroughly  in- 
dustrial city,  with  ship  building  as  its  chief  industry 
< — the  people  decided  to  have  an  unofficial  referen- 
dum on  the  liquor  question. 

All  inhabitants  above  16  years  of  age  were  asked 
to  vote.  And  how  did  the  "election"  go?  There 
were  10,068  ballots  cast — and  8,207  were  marked 
for  prohibition! 

Every  workingman  in  Great  Britain — and  millions 
of  them  in  the  United  States — knows  Will  Crooks, 
M.P.,  who  made  the  biggest  kind  of  a  fight  against 
poverty — and  won  out.  To-day  he's  a  labour  rep- 
resentative in  the  House  of  Commons.  Here's 
what  he  said  about  the  workingmen  protesting 
against  cutting  down  the  quantity  of  booze : 

"They  say  the  workingmen  will  revolt!  WHO 
SAYS?  Not  the  workingmen" 

And  here  are  more  protests  from  prominent  la- 
bour leaders: 


138  Why  Prohibition! 

W.  Straker,  secretary  of  the  Northumberland  Miners' 
Association :  "We  have  got  to  choose  whether  we  will  have 
bread  or  beer — we  cannot  have  both.  We  have  been  told 
the  Government  is  afraid  the  workingmen  would  resist  pro- 
hibition. I  repudiate  the  slander." 

Thomas  Richards,  M.P.,  secretary  of  the  South  Wales 
Miners'  Federation:  "Absolute  prohibition  of  the  manu- 
facture or  sale  of  intoxicating  liquors  in  any  form  is  essen- 
tial. I  am  satisfied  that  neither  the  fear  of  the  conse- 
quences to  those  in  the  trade,  nor  the  loss  of  their  beer,  will 
now  have  any  appreciable  effect  upon  the  workingmen  of 
this  country." 

Robert  Stewart,  J.P.,  president  of  the  Scottish  Wholesale 
Cooperative  Society,  one  of  the  largest  workingmen 's  organ- 
isations in  Scotland:  "At  the  Scotch  Cooperative  Congress, 
with  workingmen  delegates  from  all  parts  of  Scotland,  in- 
cluding the  Clyde  and  mining  districts,  out  of  845  votes 
cast,  over  800  were  for  prohibition." 

British  workingmen  have  learned  that  drink  and 
the  saloon  are  great  hindrances  to  the  progress  of 
the  people,  and,  together  with  [the  workers  of  the 
rest  of  the  world,  they  will  some  day  destroy  the 
entire  liquor  traffic. 

The  indictment  against  strong  drink  among  la- 
bouring men  in  England  must  serve  as  a  challenge 
to  every  man  who  is  interested  in  the  progress  of 
the  human  race. 

Here  is  the  testimony  of  Phillip  Snowden,  one  of 
England's  most  famous  labour  men,  regarding  the 
saloon  and  its  influence : 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    139 

"The  evil  effects  of  drinking  cannot  be  hidden.  They 
obtrude  themselves  upon  our  attention  at  every  turn.  The 
public-house  (saloon)  is  everywhere.  The  reeling  and  bru- 
talised  victims  of  drink  meet  us  in  the  streets;  the  slum 
areas  of  our  towns  reek  with  its  filthy  odours.  Drink  pulls 
men  down  to  the  gutter  from  positions  of  honour  and  use- 
fulness. The  columns  of  our  newspapers  are  filled  with 
the  stories  of  debaucheries,  assaults,  outrages  and  murders 
done  in  drink.  The  time  of  our  police  courts  is  mainly  oc- 
cupied in  hearing  cases  in  which  drink  and  the  public-house 
figure;  our  prisons  have  always  thousands  of  inmates,  sent 
there  through  drink;  our  lunatic  asylums  are  fed  to  a  con- 
siderable extent  by  drink;  judges  are  unanimous  in  assigning 
to  drink  the  responsibility  for  much  of  the  crime  they  have 
to  condemn;  doctors  ascribe  to  drink  much  of  the  physical 
degeneration  of  the  age;  and  regard  it  as  one  of  the  most 
potent  causes  of  disease,  physical  and  mental;  the  educa- 
tionalist and  social  reformer  find  drink  to  be  one  of  the  chief 
hindrances  in  their  path,  for  it  enfeebles  the  physical  strength 
of  the  workers,  it  takes  away  their  independence,  it  destroys 
their  self-respect,  it  lowers  their  ideal  of  life,  it  makes  them 
content  in  poverty  and  filth ;  it  destroys  their  intelligence,  it 
makes  them  the  easy  victims  of  every  unscrupulous  ex- 
ploiter who  seeks  to  fatten  upon  them.  A  person  does  not 
have  to  be  a  fanatical  teetotaler  to  subscribe  to  the  strongest 
indictment  which  can  be  framed  against  the  drink  traffic  as 
one  of  the  greatest  curses  which  afflict  our  country  and  man- 
kind to-day." 

How  can  labour  make  progress  when  it  is  com- 
pelled to  carry  upon  its  back  this  giant  of  Strong 
Drink?  No  wonder  that  labour  men  who  have  the 


140  Why  Prohibition! 

responsibilities  of  leadership — trade  unionists  and 
socialists — are  more  and  more  coming  out  against 
the  liquor  traffic. 

On  the  other  hand,  so  strong  is  the  feeling  against 
"boozers"  in  the  labour  movement  that  the  day  will 
soon  come  when  any  man  who  aspires  to  leadership 
among  workingmen  will  be  required  to  become  a 
total  abstainer. 

For  the  rank  and  file  of  the  workers  have  realised 
that  those  to  whom  they  have  entrusted  not  only 
their  own  welfare  but  the  destinies  of  their  wives  and 
children  must  be  clear-headed  and  alert  to  every  sit- 
uation which  may  arise  that  has  to  do  with  their 
industrial  progress. 

The  way  to  determine  whether  or  not  organised 
labour  can  afford  to  stand  for  the  saloon  is  to  find 
out  what  organised  labour  itself  stands  for  and  then' 
see  how  the  saloon  measures  up  to  its  standards. 

Organised  labour  believes  in  better  jobs  for  work- 
ingmen. The  saloon  and  its  influence  take  away  a 
man's  job. 

Organised  labour  stands  for  greater  efficiency.  The 
saloon  makes  a  working  man  less  skilful  and  drives 
him  into  lower  grades  of  employment. 

Organised  labour  agitates  for  higher  wages.  The 
saloon  and  its  influences  tend  to  lower  wages.  There 
never  yet  was  a  saloon  that  helped  a  workingman  in- 
crease his  pay  because  that  workingman  patronised 
the  saloon. 

Organised  labour  is  fighting  to  keep  children  out 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    141 

of  the  factory  and  in  the  schools.  The  saloon,  be- 
cause of  its  influence  upon  drunken  fathers  who  are 
the  natural  supporters  of  the  children,  sends  chil- 
dren into  the  factory  at  an  early  age.  It  deprives 
them  of  the  best  things  in  life;  they  are  forever 
robbed  of  the  rightful  heritage  of  childhood. 

Organised  labour  stands  for  the  dignity  and  ele- 
vation of  womankind.  It  demands  equal  pay  to  men 
and  women  for  equal  work.  The  saloon  has  a  tend- 
ency to  degrade  womanhood  and  frequently  sends 
women  down  to  the  gutter. 

Organised  labour  is  fighting  for  the  preservation 
of  the  home.  The  saloon  disintegrates  the  home, 
scatters  its  members  and  leaves  it  but  a  memory. 
There  is  no  agency  that  is  doing  more  to  destroy 
the  home  than  the  saloon.  It  is  the  chief  contribut- 
ing cause  of  poverty.  It  does  more  to  bring  about 
unemployment  than  any  other  single  factor. 

The  interests  of  the  saloon  are  always  opposed  to 
the  interests  of  the  workingman.  Therefore,  or- 
ganised labour  must  not  stand  for  the  saloon  in  any 
particular. 

It  is  very  true,  as  Samuel  Gompers  has  said,  that 
the  labour  movement,  in  its  fight  for  shorter  hours 
and  better  working  conditions  in  general,  has  de- 
creased the  tendency  of  workingmen  to  drink  booze. 
They  have  become  more  temperate  in  their  habits, 
because  their  lives  have  become  more  normal. 

But  even  Mr.  Gompers  must  know  that  the  sa- 


142  Why  Prohibition! 

loon  as  an  institution  never  helped  a  man  to  secure 
shorter  hours  or  better  working  conditions. 

If  more  temperate  living  on  the  part  of  working- 
men  is  a  desirable  thing,  and  if  shorter  hours  help 
to  make  a  man  more  temperate,  then  why  stand  for 
the  saloon,  which  helps  neither  to  secure  shorter 
hours  nor  to  make  workingmen  more  temperate  in 
their  habits? 

And  why  oppose  the  anti-saloon  movement  which 
does  both?  It  is  not  necessary  for  one  group  of 
men  who  are  bringing  about  these  desirable  results 
to  oppose  another  group  of  men  who  are  accom- 
plishing the  same  results,  simply  because  their  meth- 
ods of  approach  are  different. 

It  is  incontrovertibly  true  that  the  saloon  never 
assisted  the  workingmen  to  secure  legislation  or  to 
promote  sentiment  which  made  life  easier  and  more 
comfortable  for  the  toilers.  On  the  other  hand,  all 
of  its  tendencies  and  influences  have  been  in  the  op- 
posite direction. 

The  Mixer  and  Server  is  the  official  journal  of  the 
Bartenders'  Union.  In  a  recent  number  appeared 
an  article  on  the  "Economic  Phase  of  the  Liquor 
Traffic."  Here  are  some  quotations  from  this 
article : 

"I  freely  admit  that  the  sum  total  of  human  misery  re- 
sulting from  drunkenness  is  almost  beyond  the  comprehen- 
sion of  the  finite  mind.  The  manufacture  of  liquor  is  prob- 
ably centralised  in  fewer  hands  than  almost  any  other  busi- 
ness involving  so  much  capital,  and  the  profits  are  large.  The 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    143 

rum-seller  does  not  choose  that  business  because  he  wishes 
to  make  drunkards  and  criminals,  nor  does  he  prefer  it  to 
others.  He  knows  that  it  is  regarded  by  many  as  hardly 
respectable.  No  one  feels  this  more  keenly  than  he  and  his 
family.  With  him  running  a  saloon  is  purely  a  business 
proposition.  He  observes  that  every  line  of  business  and 
well-paid  labour  is  already  overcrowded;  yet  he  must  do 
something.  He  concludes  that  selling  whisky  is  less  risky 
and  more  lucrative  than  most  other  kinds  of  business.  H$ 
also  reasons,  perhaps,  that  if  he  does  not  engage  in  it  soma 
one  else  will.  Thus  untoward  circumstances  practically 
force  him  into  a  discreditable  and  harmful  occupation." 

These  are  rather  remarkable  confessions  to  be 
printed  in  a  journal  which  is  supposed  to  boost  the 
booze  business.  Of  course,  the  editor  does  not  pre- 
tend to  be  responsible  for  these  sentiments,  because 
they  appear  in  a  contributed  article,  but  he  deserves 
some  credit  for  printing  them,  nevertheless. 

Suppose  that  the  same  things  could  be  said  about 
any  other  business  enterprise?  Take  the  first  para- 
graph, for  example: 

"I  freely  admit  that  the  sum  total  of  human  mis- 
ery resulting  from  drunkenness  is  almost  beyond  the 
comprehension  of  the  finite  mind." 

If  it  could  be  demonstrated  that  any  other  busi- 
ness enterprise  was  responsible  for  "human  misery 
beyond  the  comprehension  of  the  finite  mind,"  there 
rs  no  doubt  that  a  strong  effort  would  be  made  to 
abolish  such  business  no  matter  how  much  profit 


144  Why  Prohibition! 

there  may  be  in  it  to  the  comparatively  few  persons 
who  are  engaged  in  conducting  it. 

Also,  can  one  imagine  the  labour  movement  which 
is  organised  to  wipe  out  human  misery,  to  enlarge 
the  life  of  the  people,  to  bring  greater  freedom  and 
happiness  to  the  masses,  and  to  emancipate  the  en- 
tire human  race  from  every  form  of  oppression  and 
misery,  endorsing  and  fighting  for  such  an  industry? 

But  this  is  what  the  trade  unionists  in  this  coun- 
try are  being  called  upon  to  do. 

The  knock-down  argument  against  the  contention 
of  the  liquor  men  that  prohibition  is  merely  a  tool 
in  the  hands  of  the  bosses  to  thwart  the  objects  of 
the  labour  movement,  is  the  statement  that  the  boss 
needs  to  fear  sober  workmen  more  than  booze- 
soaked  workmen.  And  the  bosses  know  it. 

There's  simply  no  getting  away  from  this  argu- 
ment. Short-sighted  and  silly  must  be  that  labour 
leader  who  believes  or  says  that  booze-befuddled 
brains  can  make  a  better  fight  than  sober  brains. 

If  a  labour  leader  who  indulges  in  strong  drink 
ever  wins  a  fight,  it's  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  he 
drank,  rather  than  because  of  it. 

And  the  rank  and  file  of  the  workers  know  it. 
Look  back  and  read  the  history  of  labour  men  who 
were  given  to  boozing.  As  soon  as  the  men  in  the 
shop  discovered  that  their  leaders  were  guilty  of  it, 
almost  invariably  their  heads  went  off  as  soon  as 
these  workingmen  were  given  the  chance  to  express 
their  wishes. 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    145 

The  fool  statements  being  printed  by  some  maga- 
zines that  the  anti-saloon  movement  is  "designed  to 
thwart  the  real  labour  movement,"  is  a  manifesta- 
tion of  asininity  which  is  not  reflecting  credit  on 
either  the  good  sense  or  the  wise  judgment  of  their 
editors. 

Emile  Vandervelde  was  formerly  the  Belgian 
Minister  of  State.  For  many  years  he  has  been 
fighting  alcohol.  At  the  Anti-alcohol  Congress  at 
Stockholm,  Prof.  Vandervelde  delivered  an  address 
which  has  had  wide  circulation  in  Europe.  Here 
is  the  concluding  paragraph: 

"Alcohol  lames,  it  produces  insensibilities,  it  stupefies.  It 
saps  the  energy  of  the  working  class.  It  deprives  the  workers 
of  the  feeling  and  understanding  for  the  injustices  of  which 
they  are  victims.  It  puts  to  sleep  those  whom,  in  their 
own  interest  and  the  interest  of  their  class,  we  wish  to 
awaken.  With  men  who  are  saturated  in  alcohol  a  riot  can 
be  started  but  not  a  far-reaching  revolution  which  aims 
not  merely  to  destroy  but  to  construct. 

"I  have  unlimited  faith  in  the  future  of  the  workers.  I 
am  unshakeably  convinced  that  the  dominion  of  the  world 
will  fall  to  them — head-workers  and  hand-workers.  But 
this  is  just  the  reason  why  I  lay  such  extraordinary  stress 
on  the  war  against  alcohol ;  they  who  seek  to  rule  the  world 
must  first  of  all  learn  to  control  themselves." 

The  amazing  nerve  of  the  liquor  interests  is 
typified  in  a  statement  made  by  the  President  of  the 
National  Wholesale  Liquor  Dealers'  Association  at 


146  Why  Prohibition! 

the  Annual  Convention  of  this  organisation.    Here's 
what  he  is  reported  to  have  said: 

"The  persons  engaged  in  the  liquor  business  contend  that 
they  are  simply  supplying  a  want  and  a  need.  The  demand 
is  here,  otherwise  there  would  be  no  supply;  the  people 
have  an  inalienable  and  inborn  and  God-given  right  to  their 
product;  it  relieves  more  misery  than  it  causes;  it  produces 
more  joy  than  sorrow;  it  adds  to  efficiency  instead  of  tak- 
ing away  from  it;  it  is  a  tonic  for  the  body,  a  stimulant 
for  the  body,  producing  stronger  and  healthier  minds,  which 
is  a  great  preventive  of  crime  of  all  kinds,  and  causes  a 
lesser  demand  for  institutions  such  as  jails  and  hospitals 
for  the  insane,  feeble-minded,  etc.,  than  would  be  required 
under  prohibition  or  total  abstinence." 

Alongside  of  this  statement  should  be  placed  that 
recently  issued  by  a  special  committee  of  the  So- 
cialist party  in  a  report  submitted  in  Chicago : 

"Alcohol  weakens  the  intellectual  powers.  The  very  in- 
hibitory soothing  or  deadening  influence  which  alcohol  exer- 
cises upon  both  mind  and  body,  by  which  it  enables  the  user 
to  forget  hunger,  worry,  sorrow  and  pain,  constitutes  its 
danger,  when  viewed  from  the  standpoint  of  those  who  wish 
the  workers  to  be  keen,  capable  of  sustained  effort  and  resist- 
ance to  capitalistic  oppression." 

Commenting  upon  this  report,  the  committee  de- 
clared that  the  time  has  come  when  the  Socialist  party 
must  "assume  the  offensive  in  the  liquor  question." 

Were  it  to  do  so,  it  would  be  following  the  prece- 
dent established  by  their  fellow-Socialists  in  several 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    147 

leading  European  countries,  who  have  taken  a  strong 
position  against  the  saloon  and  against  the  liquor 
traffic  in  general. 

As  between  the  National  Wholesale  Liquor  Deal- 
ers' Association,  whose  only  interest  is  that  of  sell- 
ing strong  drink,  and  the  special  committee  of  the 
Socialist  party,  whose  only  business  it  is  to  secure 
better  conditions  for  workingmen,  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  the  latter  is  a  safer  guide  in  this  instance 
than  is  the  former. 

In  a  strike  of  the  construction  workers  on  a  rail- 
road in  the  Canadian  Northwest  it  was  becoming 
evident  that  the  saloon  was  hindering  the  progress 
of  the  strike.  The  warm  stove  in  the  back  room  of 
the  saloon  was  proving  to  be  more  comfortable  than 
the  picket  line.  Anyway,  the  leaders  of  the  strike 
had  reason  to  believe  that  the  hired  thugs  of  the 
strike-breaking  concern  that  was  handling  the  job 
were  responsible  for  brawls  "in  which  it  was  easy  to 
blackjack  or  shoot  men  who  otherwise  were  active 
workers  in  the  strike." 

It  was  suspected  that  the  saloonkeepers  were  fur- 
nishing valuable  information  to  the  contractors,  and 
so  a  boycott  was  ordered  against  the  saloons,  and 
all  the  strikers  instructed  to  stay  away  from  them. 

Some  of  the  strikers  disobeyed  these  orders. 
Then  the  strike  committee  got  busy.  It  began  to 
picket  the  saloons,  as  well  as  the  contractors'  camps. 
When  a  striker  was  seen  approaching  a  saloon  he 
was  warned  to  stay  away.  Those  who  were  seen 


148  Why  Prohibition! 

sneaking  out  of  the  back  door  were  reported  to  the 
committee  and  disciplined. 

There  was  a  good  deal  of  objection  on  the  part  of 
some  of  the  men  against  this  summary  action,  but 
the  strikers,  as  a  whole,  backed  up  the  committee. 
The  tone  and  the  temper  of  the  men  were  quickly 
improved  because  of  the  absence  of  liquor  and  sa- 
loon fights.  The  strike  was  soon  settled,  because  the 
men  could  think  through  their  own  problems  more 
clearly,  and  they  secured  quicker  and  more  intelli- 
gent action.  Incidentally  the  bosses  had  a  greater 
respect  for  the  strikers. 

It  isn't  so  long  ago  that  the  writer,  as  a  machin- 
ist, with  others  in  a  big  New  York  shop,  went  out 
on  a  strike. 

The  men  proceeded  to  a  big  hall  back  of  a  saloon 
to  talk  over  their  "grievances."  Day  after  day  they 
met  in  this  hall,  and  during  the  intervals  of  the  meet- 
ings many  of  them  made  the  saloon  their  "head- 
quarters." 

When  the  time  for  the  regular  meeting  arrived, 
and  when  matters  of  great  importance  were  to  be 
talked  over  and  decided,  scores  of  the  men  were  not 
only  unfit  to  think  clearly  but  they  were  in  no  con- 
dition to  act  fairly,  either  to  themselves  or  toward 
the  boss,  because  they  had  indulged  too  freely  in 
booze. 

How  much  damage  was  done  to  all  the  men  and 
their  families  on  this  account  nobody  can  tell. 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    149 

If  saloons  and  consequent  drunkenness  are  bad 
for  the  workers  when  they  are  out  on  strike,  they 
are  bad  for  them  at  all  other  times,  particularly  when 
workingmen  meet  to  discuss  the  most  serious  prob- 
lems which  confront  any  group. 

Muddled  brains  are  a  great  handicap  to  any  man. 
They  are  especially  bad  for  men  who  are  deciding 
the  future  of  large  numbers  of  workers  and  the  des- 
tinies of  their  wives  and  children.  And  booze  al- 
ways muddles  men's  brains. 

Daniel  J.  Keefe,  for  many  years  President  of  the 
Longshoremen's  Union,  said  in  one  of  his  annual 
reports,  regarding  the  influence  of  liquor: 

"The  greatest  foe  the  toiler  has  to  combat  is  liquor.  Low 
wages  and  long  hours  furnish  the  greatest  number  of  vic- 
tims of  intemperance.  It  is  this  enemy  of  progress  that  has 
kept  many  a  man  at  the  foot  of  the  ladder  who  would 
otherwise  have  made  a  mark  in  the  world. 

"No  man  who  works  for  wages  can  afford  to  drink  if  he 
hopes  to  better  his  condition,  or  will  allow  the  demon  of 
drink  to  steal  away  his  health  and  strength,  leaving  him 
a  prey  to  disease,  want  and  poverty. 

"It  is  the  duty  of  strong  men  to  counsel  and  advise  their 
weaker  brothers,  and  set  an  example  of  sobriety  for  them, 
discouraging  that  character  of  sociability  which  leads  to  the 
ruin  of  so  many  of  our  young  men.  Any  movement  of 
temperance  reform  should  receive  our  hearty  cooperation." 

A  rather  significant  resolution  was  introduced  at 
the  convention  of  the  American  Federation  of  La- 


150  Why  Prohibition! 

bor  in  San  Francisco  by  Delegate  Homer  D.  Call, 
of  the  Amalgamated  Meat  Cutters  and  Butcher 
Workmen,  with  reference  to  "certain  organised 
crafts" — referring  to  the  bartenders  and  allied 
"crafts." 

Here's  the  resolution : 

"WHEREAS,  There  are  now  certain  organised  crafts  that 
are  opposing  the  efforts  of  the  Butcher  Workmen  in  some 
localities  in  their  efforts  to  secure  the  closing  of  Meat  Mar- 
kets on  Sunday;  and, 

"WHEREAS,  The  American  Federation  of  Labor  has  at 
several  conventions  gone  on  record  as  favouring  one  day's 
rest  in  seven;  therefore,  be  it 

"Resolved,  That  this  Thirty-fifth  Annual  Convention  of 
the  American  Federation  of  Labor  endorses  the  action  of 
the  Amalgamated  Meat  Cutters  and  Butcher  Workmen  of 
North  America  in  their  efforts  to  secure  the  Sunday  closing 
of  meat  markets  in  all  localities  and  pledge  them  their  moral 
support  in  their  efforts." 

Talk  about  "class  interest"!  What  the  liquor 
delegates  to  labour  conventions  mean  when  they  talk 
about  class  interest  is  their  class!  Everybody  else 
may  get  along  as  best  they  may.  The  same  group 
of  labour  leaders  who  have  opposed  the  working- 
men  in  meat  markets  in  their  efforts  to  secure  "one 
day's  rest  in  seven"  have  also  opposed  the  barbers 
in  the  same  way,  and  for  the  same  reason. 

And  why  do  the  bartenders  fight  for  a  seven-day 
week  ?  Don't  they  like  to  have  Sunday  off  ?  Surely 
they  do,  but  in  order  to  perfect  their  own  organisa- 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    151 

tion,  they  have  been  compelled  to  sell  themselves  to 
the  saloonkeepers,  promising  to  support  any  meas- 
ure that  may  be  considered  in  the  interest  of  the 
liquor  business,  no  matter  how  much  it  may  be  op- 
posed to  the  interest  of  their  fellow  trade  unionists ! 
If  meat  markets  are  closed  on  Sunday,  what  chance 
will  a  saloon  have  to  open  its  doors  on  Sunday? 

They  are  quite  ready  to  stab  decent  labour  men 
in  the  back  while  they  are  trying  to  secure  legisla- 
tion which  every  humane  and  moral  organisation 
in  the  land  is  fighting  for,  but  when  it  comes  to  elec- 
tion time,  and  their  bosses'  business  is  in  danger — 
then  up  goes  the  cry  of  "Brother,  help  us!"  to  these 
workingmen  whom  they  have  betrayed — sounds  like 
the  cowardly  cry  of  "Kamerad"  that  comes  from  the 
German  trenches. 

Some  day  the  double-faced  trickery  of  the  liquor 
men  in  the  labour  business  will  be  shown  up  so  clearly 
that  all  true  trade  unionists  will  throw  them  out  of 
the  labour  movement. 

"The  Hotel  and  Restaurant  Employes7  Interna- 
tional Alliance  and  Bartenders'  International  League 
of  America,"  is  the  1 3-word  name  of  this  unscrupu- 
lous labour  union  which  comprises  waiters,  wait- 
resses, cooks,  porters,  pantrymen,  silvermen,  vege- 
tablemen,  cooks'  helpers,  dishwashers — and  bartend- 
ers. 

For  quite  a  number  of  years  the  culinary  workers 
have  been  trying  to  cut  loose  from  the  bartenders. 
But  the  international  officers  have  so  dominated  the 


152  Why  Prohibition! 

conventions  of  their  organization  that  thus  far  this 
has  been  impossible. 

At  the  San  Francisco  convention  of  this  organisa- 
tion, it  was  decided  by  an  overwhelming  vote  to  de- 
cline to  permit  even  the  introduction  of  a  resolution 
which  would  pave  the  way  for  a  division  of  the  or- 
ganisation into  two  international  unions — one  com- 
posed of  bartenders,  and  the  other  consisting  of  bona 
fide  culinary  workers.  And  yet  the  international  of- 
ficers who  control  the  destinies  of  the  cooks,  waiters 
and  bartenders  are  everlastingly  shouting  about 
"personal  liberty" — this  in  the  face  of  their  refusal 
to  permit  the  membership  of  their  organisation  in 
the  spirit  of  democracy — for  which  organised  labour 
stands — to  determine  their  own  destiny ! 

"Secession"  is  the  worst  heresy  in  the  labour  move- 
ment. This  makes  it  well-nigh  impossible  for  the  culi- 
nary workers  to  cut  loose  from  the  bartenders  unless 
the  bartenders  permit  them  to  do  so.  It  is  likely, 
therefore,  that  the  only  way  in  which  they  will  ever 
get  relief  is  through  the  abolition  of  the  liquor  traffic 
when  there  will  be  no  further  need  of  bartenders. 

The  cooks  and  waiters  in  a  certain  city  were  on 
strike  for  higher  wages  and  improved  working  con- 
ditions. They  naturally  expected  their  ally,  the  Bar- 
tenders' Union,  to  act  with  them,  but  no  co-operation 
could  be  had  from  the  bartenders. 

The  cooks  and  waiters  officially  passed  resolutions 
pleading  with  the  bartenders  to  come  out  and  help 
them  because  they  are  an  official  part  of  their  union, 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    153 

but  the  bartenders  aren't  very  anxious  to  help  their 
"brothers,"  because  as  just  stated,  the  bartenders 
have  given  their  employers  a  definite  promise  that 
they  will  stand  by  them  in  all  their  troubles,  on  con- 
dition that  they  (the  bartenders)  be  permitted  to 
organise ! 

It's  anything  to  save  the  Bartenders'  Union — no 
matter  what  becomes  of  the  "brothers"  in  other 
unions,  who  are  continually  being  called  upon  by  the 
Bartenders'  Union  to  stand  by  them  in  their  fight 
against  the  "anti-saloon  crowd." 

Here  is  a  striking  letter  from  Frank  H.  Kennedy, 
the  editor  of  the  Western  Laborer,  of  Omaha : 

"This  you  may  depend  on — the  Western  Laborer  will 
never  let  up  until  the  booze  industry  of  this  country  stops 
using  organised  labour  as  a  badge  of  respectability  and  pla- 
cards it  as  such  in  all  the  windows  of  all  the  booze  joints  in 
the  country. 

"Organised  Labour  is  as  good  as  the  Elks,  Masons,  Wood- 
men, Knights  of  Columbus,  or  the  other  decent,  respectable 
organisations  of  this  country,  and  the  booze  industry  would 
not  dare  use  any  of  these  as  a  front  for  their  game." 

In  a  two-page  advertisement  which  appeared  in 
Washington  newspapers  while  the  Senate  was  dis- 
cussing the  question  of  war-prohibition  it  was  de- 
clared that  2,082,637  union  workingmen  petitioned 
the  President  and  Congress  against  "cutting  off  their 
booze." 

This  advertisement  was  a  fake — here  are  the 
facts : 


154  Why  Prohibition! 

First,  according  to  the  official  report  of  the  secre- 
tary of  the  American  Federation  of  Labor  at  the 
time  this  petition  was  being  prepared  there  were 
10,000  fewer  members  in  the  Federation  than  there 
were  alleged  signers  of  the  petition. 

Second,  only  twenty-two  states  are  mentioned  in 
this  petition,  and  yet  the  number  of  alleged  signers 
from  but  twenty-two  states  is  greater  than  the  total 
membership  of  the  American  Federation  of  Labor 
in  forty-eight  states. 

Third,  as  a  matter  of  fact  this  petition  was  not 
signed  by  individual  workingmen.  In  most  cases  a 
small  minority  of  the  members  of  the  organisations 
mentioned  presumed  to  speak  for  the  entire  member- 
ship. 

Fourth,  only  445  local  labour  bodies  out  of  22,000 
local  labour  unions  are  listed  as  having  signed  the 
petition. 

Fifth,  in  many  cases  individual  trade  unionists 
were  counted  again  and  again:  first,  in  their  inter- 
national organisations;  second,  in  their  state  labour 
bodies;  third,  in  their  central  labour  unions;  fourth, 
in  their  local  unions;  fifth,  in  such  organisations  as 
personal  liberty  leagues,  mutual  benefit  societies,  etc. 
For  example — over  150,000  of  those  enumerated  as 
being  identified  with  union  label  trade  departments, 
labor  temple  associations,  sick  benefit  funds,  mutual 
benefit  societies  and  personal  liberty  leagues,  are 
counted  a  second  time  in  bona  fide  labour  unions. 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    155 

The  alleged  petition  is  a  slander  and  an  insult  to 
vast  numbers  of  the  finest  type  of  American  work- 
ingmen. 

Besides — it  is  a  deliberate  attempt  to  deceive  not 
only  workingmen  but  the  public  in  general.  The 
men  who  printed  and  paid  for  this  advertisement 
know  that  they  lied.  Every  trade  unionist  who 
stops  to  think  about  it  knows  that  they  lied.  Any 
man  who  can  read  the  English  language  knows  that 
they  lied — if  he  will  take  the  trouble  to  analyse 
their  figures. 

If  the  leaders  of  the  wet  campaign  lied  about 
workingmen  they  will  lie  to  workingmen,  and  they 
will  lie  to  and  about  anybody  else, — even  the  Presi- 
dent of  the  United  States — it's  anything  to  get  away 
with  the  goods. 

Labour  is  being  made  the  tail  for  the  liquor  men's 
kite.  And  it's  getting  labour  nowhere.  Like  the  tail 
to  a  regular  kite,  labour  serves  to  make  the  liquor 
business  a  "steady"  business:  but  it's  the  kite  that 
gets  ahead^ — the  tail  comes  in  as  a  trailer, — and  it 
comes  in  last. 

Labour  is  using  its  influence  to  keep  the  liquor 
business  "square  to  the  wind"  because  Labour  seems 
to  have  a  notion  that  its  interests  are  tied  up  with  the 
interests  of  the  liquor  business. 

The  only  way  that  Labour  is  tied  up  to  the  liquor 
business  is  in  such  a  way  as  to  make  it  profitable  for 
the  liquor  business. 

Without  the  support  of  Labour  the  liquor  busi- 


156  Why  Prohibition! 

ness  could  not  exist.  This  does  not  mean  that  labour- 
ing men  are  the  chief  supporters  of  the  individual 
saloon  by  buying  booze — Labour  is  supporting  the 
saloon  by  voting  for  its  retention. 

Being  a  tail  to  the  liquor  business  is  a  job  alto- 
gether unworthy  of  Labour. 

It's  also  a  losing  game  for  Labour. 

It's  a  losing  game  because  no  matter  how  much 
balance  Labour  may  give  the  liquor  business,  the  lat- 
ter will  soon  begin  to  "dive." 

Your  small  boy  can  tell  you  what  happens  to  a 
"diving  kite."  And  when  the  kite  goes  to  smash,! 
somehow  the  tail  gets  tangled  up  in  the  debris. 

It's  going  to  take  a  lot  of  nerve  for  labour  men 
to  do  to  the  liquor  business  what  their  good  sense  al- 
ready tells  them  is  the  only  reasonable  thing  to  do — 
throw  off  the  yoke  of  the  men  who  are  engaged  in 
it,  and  then  destroy  it  absolutely. 

And  when  this  happens  there  will  be  such  a  revival 
in  the  labour  movement  as  it  has  never  seen  before. 
As  it  is,  not  only  is  the  saloon  a  drag  on  working- 
men,  both  unionists  and  non-unionists,  but  those  who 
have  anything  to  do  with  the  saloon — brewers,  bar- 
tenders, distillers  and  all  others  who  are  tied  up 
with  the  business — are  a  distinct  detriment  to  the 
cause  of  the  workingman. 

When  any  great  moral  issue  arises  in  the  com- 
munity the  saloon  and  those  who  are  identified  with 
it  are  sure  to  be  on  the  wrong  side.  This  means 
that  they  will  do  everything  in  their  power  to  drag 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    157 

with  them  those  whom  they  may  influence  for  what- 
ever reason. 

The  trade  unionists  who  are  engaged  in  any  form 
of  the  liquor  business  constantly  remind  their  fellow 
trade  unionists,  engaged  in  other  occupations,  of  the 
pledge  which  they  assumed — to  stand  by  a  "brother'* 
who  is  in  trouble  of  any  kind.  They  forget  that 
the  labour  movement  is  a  movement  in  the  interest 
of  the  entire  working  class.  Furthermore,  if  any 
particular  group  of  men — who  happen  to  be  trade 
unionists  merely  for  what  they  get  out  of  the  union 
and  not  for  what  they  put  into  it — clearly  prove 
themselves  to  be  a  curse  to  labour,  then  by  every 
principle  of  the  labour  movement  these  men  should 
be  expelled  from  the  ranks  of  organised  labour. 

As  already  stated,  it  will  take  a  lot  of  nerve  to 
do  this  job,  but  some  day  the  best  men  in  the  labour 
movement  will  rise  up  with  the  determination  to  see 
this  thing  through  at  whatever  cost. 

There  never  yet  was  a  reform  movement  calcu- 
lated to  benefit  working  people  but  what  somebody 
insisted  that  its  introduction  would  spell  "ruin"  for 
some  industry  or  group  of  people. 

Centuries  ago  the  labour  guilds,  including  masters 
and  men  pitted  their  strength  against  the  advancing 
Christian  army.  Back  to  the  time  when  no  man 
can  remember,  and  before  history  began  the  people 
had  been  worshipping  the  "unknown  god"  through 
amulet  and  idol.  The  manufacture  of  these  had  be- 
come an  industry  which  gave  employment  to  great 


158  Why  Prohibition! 

hosts  of  workers.  Formed  into  various  guilds  or 
trade  unions  they  sought  to  preserve  their  crafts 
against  the  growing  tendencies  of  Christian  converts 
to  discontinue  the  use  of  fetish  or  dumb  gods.  A 
remarkably  well  authenticated  instance  of  this  is 
found  in  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles.  Ephesus  was  the 
seat  of  the  great  temple  of  Diana.  To  it  were  at- 
tracted the  worshippers  who  purchased  silver  shrines, 
fashioned  by  the  smiths  who  made  their  living 
through  the  sale  of  these  idols.  But  one  day  Paul, 
the  Apostle,  appeared  in  their  midst  and  preached 
a  new  doctrine — the  doctrine  of  the  unknown  God 
whom  the  people  had  been  seeking  in  vain. 

The  finding  of  the  true  God  began  to  work  revo- 
lutions. The  idols  were  cast  out,  the  temple  was 
deserted  by  the  people  of  the  new  found  faith.  Soon 
the  effect  of  this  became  apparent  to  Demetrius,  the 
silversmith,  leader  of  the  guild.  He  assembled  the 
men  engaged  in  his  craft,  who  raised  a  great  outcry; 
"Great  is  Diana  of  the  Ephesians !"  A  mob  quickly 
came  together,  and  then  the  truth  was  revealed. 
These  silversmiths  were  not  so  much  concerned  about 
Diana  as  they  were  about  the  permanency  of  their 
craft.  This  man  Paul,  whom  they  were  opposing, 
was,  through  his  preaching,  driving  out  their  busi- 
ness. What  if  the  people  were  living  in  heathen 
darkness;  what  if  the  progress  of  the  race  was  im- 
peded— the  chief  and  apparently  the  only  considera- 
tion was  the  personal  welfare  of  the  silversmiths. 

So  strong  and  so  persistent  was  the  opposition,  and 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    159 

so  subtle  the  arguments  of  the  craftsmen,  that  later 
in  many  parts  of  the  then  known  world  a  compromise 
was  reached  between  certain  leaders  of  the  Church 
and  the  leaders  of  labour  guilds  to  the  effect  that  the 
heathen  paraphernalia  be  retained,  although  the  true 
God  might  be  worshipped,  and  this  we  find  even  in 
our  day — but  the  continued  sin  of  idol  worship  may 
be  laid  at  the  doors  of  the  labour  guilds  of  the  Apos- 
tolic days.  The  story  is  graphically  told  in  C.  Os- 
borne  Ward's  "The  Ancient  Lowly,"  which  tells  of 
the  rise  of  the  working  class. 

When  those  who  fought  against  child  labor  in' 
glass  factories  a  few  years  ago  objected  to  little  boys 
entering  these  factories  at  so  tender  an  age,  it  was 
answered  that  it  was  necessary  for  them  to  do  so, 
"so  that  they  might  early  become  accustomed  to  the 
heat."  But  when  they  abolished  child  labor  in  glass 
factories  it  was  discovered  that  older  boys  soon 
learned  to  endure  the  heat  at  least  as  well  as  those 
who  were  younger.  Many  of  the  employers  of  these 
little  children  said  that  if  they  were  compelled  to 
dismiss  the  children  in  their  employ  it  would  "ruin" 
their  business.  But  they  soon  found  out  that  instead 
of  being  ruined,  their  business  went  forward  by 
leaps  and  bounds.  The  same  has  been  true  in  other 
industries. 

Always  has  there  been  opposition  to  the  things 
which  meant  progress  to  the  great  mass  of  people. 
Either  the  employing  group  were  opposed  to  these 
reforms,  or  the  so-called  "intellectual"  group  dis- 


160  Why  Prohibition! 

approved  of  them,  or  a  considerable  portion  of  the 
masses,  themselves,  were  betrayed  or  misinformed. 
But  finally  the  common  people  won  out  in  every  case. 
As  a  result  of  these  experiences  we  have  become  sus- 
picious of  men  who  cry,  "Ruin!  Ruin!"  when  other 
reforms  are  suggested.  Perhaps  it  is  natural  that 
they  should  desire  above  all  things  to  continue  in  a 
business  with  which  they  have  become  familiar,  no 
matter  what  its  consequences  to  the  masses  of  the 
people.  They  dislike  to  do  the  more  difficult  and 
perhaps  less  profitable  thing — even  though  the 
change  would  undoubtedly  benefit  the  vast  majority 
of  the  people. 

This  applies  specifically  to  the  liquor  business.  Its 
owners  have  long  since  ceased  to  defend  it  upon 
a  moral  basis.  They  know  very  well  that  it  cannot 
be  harmonised  with  the  modern  tendency  toward 
efficiency.  They  have  been  overwhelmingly  defeated 
by  Jife  insurance  men  upon  the  basis  of  health  and 
life.  They  are  now  taking  the  last  stand  of  the 
greedy  capitalists,  declaring  that  they  and  their  em- 
ployes would  be  ruined  if  beer  and  whiskey  were 
abolished.  Even  if  this  were  true,  there  are  other 
considerations  which  must  enter  into  the  final  verdict. 
But  it  isn't  true,  and  the  liquor  men,  themselves, 
know  it  isn't  true.  They  would  be  forced  to  adjust 
themselves  to  the  new  situation,  but  others  have  done 
the  same  thing — both  employers  and  workmen — and 
won  out. 

To-day  the  trade  union  is  facing  a  great  crisis. 


Organised  Labour  and  the  Saloon    161 

The  forces  opposing  the  liquor  interests  are  gather- 
ing strength,  and  ere  long  the  saloon  shall  go  if  the 
people  finish  the  task  which  they  have  so  well  begun. 
But  again  the  craftsmen  who  live  by  the  profits  of 
an  evil  which  is  even  more  generally  recognised  than 
was  the  sin  of  idol  worship  in  the  days  of  Paul  are 
making  protest.  It  seems  natural  that  men  should 
oppose  a  movement  which  threatens  to  destroy  their 
positions  as  craftsmen. 

They  have  their  families  to  support,  and  their 
own  welfare  to  consider,  they  insist.  But  is  there 
no  other  consideration? 

Must  the  saloon,  with  its  attendant  evils,  for 
which  no  man  can  successfully  argue,  always  remain 
with  us,  simply  because  its  removal  will  cause  a  re- 
adjustment in  industry,  and  because  many  of  those 
now  engaged  in  the  brewing  and  allied  interests  must 
make  a  living  in  other  ways  which  will  work  no  harm 
to  their  fellows?  That  they  will  all  find  work,  there 
can  be  no  doubt,  but  shall  the  trade  union  be  made 
the  scapegoat  for  an  evil  which  it  is  sought  to  con- 
tinue against  the  best  judgment  of  increasing  num- 
bers of  workingmen?  Shall  future  generations  hold 
it  against  organised  labour  that  in  the  twentieth  cen- 
tury it  allied  itself  with  those  who  stood  for  the  sin 
and  debauchery  of  the  saloon?  Shall  the  saloon 
dominate  the  labour  movement,  when  every  other 
decent  organisation  and  institution  is  breaking  loose 
from  the  power  of  the  saloon?  These  are  questions 
which  organised  labour  must  answer. 


VIII 
The  Saloon  and  Social  Reform 

IT  is  easily  possible  to  make  out  a  case  for  the 
"wets"  by  using  only  certain  groups  of  statistics- 
leaving  out  altogether  some  fundamental  facts  for 
which  statistics  do  not  usually  account. 

The  purpose  of  this  chapter  is  chiefly  to  present 
some  illustrations  of  what  liquor  men  fail  to  discuss 
when  they  argue  through  the  use  of  figures  for  the 
merits  of  the  saloon  and  the  use  of  liquor. 

Statistics  on  the  divorce  question  in  dry  and  wet 
states  seem  to  indicate  that  many  of  the  dry  states 
have  an  excess  of  divorce  cases  over  some  wet  states. 
But  before  one  accepts  the  verdict  which  these  figures 
appear  to  give,  it  is  necessary  to  consider  some  im- 
portant facts  which  have  a  direct  bearing  upon  the 
entire  divorce  problem. 

The  states  in  this  country  which  are  wettest  are 
predominantly  Roman  Catholic.  It  is  well  known 
that  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  has  always  stood 
as  a  bulwark  against  granting  divorces.  This  ac- 
counts in  a  large  measure  for  the  apparently  low 
percentage  of  divorces  granted  in  some  wet  states. 

The  wettest  states  in  this  country  are  industrial 

162 


The  Saloon  and  Social  Reform    163 

in  character  and  strongly  foreign  in  their  popula- 
tions. Every  social  worker  who  has  had  experience 
among  the  poor  in  our  cities  knows  that  there  are 
large  numbers  of  desertions  which  are  never  re- 
corded in  the  divorce  courts.  Husbands  and  wives 
leave  each  other  without  going  through  the  for- 
mality of  a  divorce  suit.  If  all  these  cases  could  be 
recorded,  there  isn't  the  least  doubt  that  they  would 
greatly  outnumber  the  cases  in  which  "regular"  or 
legal  divorces  were  obtained  in  dry  states. 

The  difference  in  divorce  laws  in  the  various  states 
must  be  taken  into  consideration.  For  a  long  time 
the  older  states  in  the  East,  which  happen  to  be  the 
wettest,  have  had  more  stringent  divorce  laws  than 
some  mid-western  or  far-western  states.  Without 
uniform  divorce  laws  it  is  extremely  difficult  to  make 
fair  comparisons  on  this  point. 

Furthermore,  as  divorces  are  most  frequently 
granted  to  people  living  in  the  states  which  are  pre- 
dominantly American,  or  to  those  who  are  Ameri- 
cans by  birth,  one  would  be  compelled  to  admit,  on 
the  basis  of  the  liquor  men's  argument,  that  Ameri- 
cans are  more  immoral  than  are  the  people  of  other 
nationalities,  assuming  that  immorality  is  the  chief 
cause  for  divorce.  It  is  true  that  in  the  United 
States  we  grant  more  divorces  than  are  granted  in 
any  other  civilised  country  in  the  world,  with  the 
possible  exception  of  Japan. 

We  grant  one  divorce  for  every  12  marriages,  as 
against  one  divorce  for  every  22  marriages  in  Swit- 


164  Why  Prohibition! 

zerland,  one  for  every  30  marriages  in  France,  one 
for  every  44  marriages  in  Germany  and  one  for 
every  400  marriages  in  England.  Does  this  mean 
that  Americans  are  more  immoral  than  are  the  peo- 
ple in  these  foreign  countries?  Not  at  all.  It 
means,  in  the  first  place,  that  our  divorce  laws  are 
more  lax,  but  it  is  also  due  to  the  fact  that  Americans 
are  more  high-strung  or  temperamental  in  their  na- 
tures. It  is  a  curious — and  at  the  same  time  a  de- 
plorable situation — that,  as  people  become  more 
sensitive  to  the  finer  things  in  life,  the  dangers  of 
incompatibility  increase.  This  has  been  the  condition 
in  some  strongly  American  communities,  whether 
they  were  wet  or  dry. 

It  should  be  remembered  in  this  connection,  that 
divorces  are  rarely  granted  in  wet  states  for  drunk- 
enness, even  though  this  may  be  the  real  cause  for 
seeking  a  divorce,  but  because  of  the  inability  to 
secure  a  divorce  on  this  ground,  some  other  reason 
which  will  stand  in  the  courts  is  given  by  the  com- 
plainant. For  this  reason  the  actual  number  of  di- 
vorces granted  on  account  of  drunkenness  is  never 
made  public,  because  it  is  rarely  made  a  matter  of 
record. 

Exponents  of  the  liquor  business  are  making  much 
of  the  statistics  indicating  the  number  of  homicides 
committed  in  "dry"  states.  They  are  insisting  that 
more  murders  are  committed  in  dry  cities  than  in 
wet,  the  inference  being  that  the  more  sober  a  man 
<may  be  the  more  likely  he  is  to  kill  his  fellowmen! 


The  Saloon  and  Social  Reform    165 

Of  course  we  all  know  that  a  drinking  man  with 
a  revolver  or  a  knife  is  a  much  SAFER  man  to  get 
along  with  than  one  who  is  sober,  because  a  drunken 
man  has  better  control  of  himself  than  has  a  sober 
man,  and  is  not  nearly  so  likely  to  do  as  much  dam- 
age. This  must  be  apparent  to  every  one — even  to 
young  children — because  they  feel  so  safe  with 
armed  drunken  men! 

It  happens  that  among  the  cities  which  have  a 
high  percentage  of  homicides  some  are  in  dry  states. 
But  everybody  knows  that  in  these  cities  the  law 
against  the  use  of  liquor  is  not  enforced  as  it  should 
be. 

The  result  is  that  to  these  cities  gravitate  the 
rough  element  of  the  state,  because  the  anti-liquor 
laws  are  enforced  in  the  towns  from  which  they 
came.  Hence,  the  average  big  city  in  a  Prohibition 
state  gets  more  than  its  just  share  of  booze  drinkers. 

Furthermore,  it  will  be  noted  that  most  of  the 
cities  which  have  a  high  percentage  of  homicides  are 
in  southern  states,  which  are  confronted  by  peculiar 
racial  and  temperamental  problems.  This  must  be 
obvious  to  every  student  of  American  life. 

In  some  parts  of  our  country  which  have  a  low 
percentage  of  homicides,  when  a  man  calls  another 
man  a  liar,  the  one  who  is  accused  will  simply  smile 
and  pass  on,  whereas  in  other  parts  of  the  country 
he  is  likely  to  pull  a  gun  and  kill  the  man  who  accused 
him  of  being  a  liar.  It  isn't  a  question  of  booze  in 
this  case,  it's  a  question  of  temperament,  and  the 


1 66  Why  Prohibition! 

latter  accounts  for  the  actions  of  many  people, 
whether  they  live  in  dry  territory  or  wet  territory. 

It  is  urged  by  those  who  represent  the  interests 
of  the  saloon  that  there  are  more  Church  members 
in  wet  states  than  there  are  in  dry  states. 

When  anybody  says  that  the  saloon  has  a  tend- 
ency to  make  men  religious  and  Church  members  he 
is  a  subject  for  observation  by  a  lunacy  commission. 

The  liquor  men,  themselves,  who  are  responsible 
for  the  above  statement  do  not  really  advocate  the 
saloon  as  a  missionary  or  evangelistic  enterprise. 
They  merely  wish  us  to  infer  that  the  presence  of 
saloons  does  not  reduce  interest  in  religious  matters. 

It  is  apparent  that  in  making  their  statistics  the 
saloon  men  have  not  taken  into  consideration  the 
methods  of  calculating  Church  membership  by  the 
various  denominations.  For  example,  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church  counts  its  memberships  by  house- 
holds— or  by  the  number  of  persons  baptised 
— and  not  by  individuals,  as  most  Protestant 
Churches  do.  This  method  of  counting  Church 
members  is  not  being  called  in  question.  There  is 
pretty  good  Scriptural  authority  for  it,  but  when 
methods  of  counting  Church  members  in  states  which 
are  wet  and  at  the  same  time  strongly  Catholic  in 
their  makeup  are  applied  to  states  which  are  dry  and 
strongly  Protestant,  this  basis  of  comparison  isn't 
fair  to  the  latter  group  of  states. 

Generally  speaking,  it  happens  that  the  Catholic 


The  Saloon  and  Social  Reform     167 

Church  is  the  leading  denomination  in  states  which 
are  wet,  and  the  Protestant  Church  prevails  in  the 
states  which  are  dry.  Take,  for  example,  the  nine 
states  which  were  dry  prior  to  January  i,  1915. 
Following  are  the  percentages  of  Church  members 
in  Protestant  and  Catholic  Churches,  according  to 
the  Government  Reports  on  Religious  Bodies  for  the 
census  taken  in  1906,  the  latest  reports  available: 

Dry  States 
Percentage  of  Church  Members 

States                                              Protestant  Catholic 

Georgia    41.2  0.8 

North  Carolina 39.8  O.2 

Mississippi    36.7  1.7 

Tennessee    3 1 .2  0.8 

Kansas    22.4  5.8 

West  Virginia 24.1  3.7 

North  Dakota 21.0  13.2 

Oklahoma 15.5  2.6 

Maine    13.5  15.9 

The  figures  for  the  nine  wettest  states  on  January 
i,  1915,  in  point  of  Church  membership  are  as  fol- 
lows : 

Wet  States 
Percentage  of  Church  Members 

States  Protestant     Catholic 

New  Mexico   6.7  56.2 

Rhode   Island    13.1  40.0 


168  Why  Prohibition! 

States  Protestant  Catholic 

Connecticut    19.5  29.8 

New  York 15.0  27.8 

Montana    8.0  23.8 

Nevada    7.6  23.6 

Arizona    6.3  20.7 

New  Jersey 18.6  2O.I 

Pennsylvania    24.8  17.5 

There  are  several  states  to  which  the  above  would 
not  apply,  because  it  does  not  necessarily  follow  that 
large  Church  memberships  of  any  denomination 
mean  an  open  antagonism  to  the  liquor  business. 
There  are  many  different  factors  which  enter  into 
this  proposition,  and  they  are  as  varied  as  there 
are  states  in  question. 

It  should  also  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  fight  on 
the  saloon  has  but  recently  been  crystallised,  and  that 
the  forces  which  are  actually  opposed  to  it  are  just 
beginning  to  assert  themselves. 

But  after  every  apology  has  been  made  with  ref- 
erence to  the  indifference  of  all  kinds  of  Church 
members  to  the  peril  of  the  saloon,  one  fact  still 
stands  out  in  the  minds  of  all  classes  of  people — the 
saloon  and  all  that  it  stands  for  neither  makes  men 
more  religious  nor  does  it  incline  them  toward  the 
Church  and  all  that  it  represents.  And  no  one  except 
an  absurdly  foolish  liquor  statistician  would  attempt 
to  prove  otherwise. 

"Why  has  Kansas,  with  Prohibition  since   1880, 


The  Saloon  and  Social  Reform    169 

over  1,000  vacant  church  edifices  ?"  asks  the  Na- 
tional  Herald,  the  official  organ  of  the  Liquor  Deal- 
ers' Association.  And  it  demands  that  "Mr.  Prohi- 
bitionist stand  up  and  answer/' 

In  the  first  place,  it  is  a  debatable  question  whether 
"Kansas  actually  has  1,000  vacant  church  edifices. 
But  assuming  that  there  are  so  many,  here  are  some 
reasons  which  account  for  this  condition : 

Many  of  these  old  church  buildings  have  been 
abandoned  because  the  congregations  that  formerly 
occupied  them  have  removed  to  bigger  and  better 
buildings,  and  the  old  place  has  remained  vacant 
because  church  buildings  are  not  easily  sold  for  other 
purposes. 

Others  of  these  church  buildings  are  vacant 
because  a  number  of  the  congregations  in  the  town 
have  wisely  consolidated  in  order  to  do  more  ef- 
fective work  in  the  community. 

But  the  principal  reason  why  there  are  vacant 
church  buildings  in  Kansas  is  because  of  the  ten- 
dency of  the  population  to  move  toward  the  city — 
and  practically  every  vacant  church  in  Kansas  is  in 
the  rural  district. 

This  tendency,  which  is  almost  entirely  due  to 
social  and  economic  causes,  is  nation-wide.  The  fol- 
lowing table  will  indicate  the  percentage  of  loss  in 
population  in  rural  districts,  and  the  percentage  of 
gain  of  the  urban  population  throughout  the  United 
States : 


170  Why  Prohibition! 

Proportion  of  Population  in  Urban  and  Rural  Districts 

1910  1900  1890  1880 

Total  per  cent 100.0  100.0  100.0  100.0 

Urban    46.3  40.5  36.1  29.5 

Rural   53.7  59.5  63.9  70.5 

In  every  state  in  this  country  large  numbers  of 
counties  are  losing  in  population  because  the  people 
are  going  to  the  city. 

Discussing  for  a  moment  the  loss  in  population 
in  some  of  the  larger  wet  states  we  find  the  follow- 
ing: Out  of  1 02  counties  in  Illinois,  50  lost  in 
population  from  1900  to  1910.  Out  of  115  counties 
in  Missouri,  68  lost  in  population  between  1900  and 
1910.  Out  of  88  counties  in  Ohio,  39  lost  in  popu- 
lation from  1 900  to  1910. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  proportionately  there  are 
as  many  vacant  churches  in  Ohio,  Illinois  and  Mis- 
souri as  there  are  in  Kansas.  This  condition  is  not  at 
all  peculiar  to  Kansas  nor  to  any  other  dry  state. 
The  entire  situation  is  due  to  social  and  economic 
conditions  in  which  the  liquor  problem  figures  to  a 
very  inconsiderable  extent.  And  remember  that  the 
vacant  church  proposition  is  limited  practically  alto- 
gether to  the  rural  districts,  and  keep  in  mind  the 
very  obvious  fact  that  decreased  population  in  any 
community  naturally  results  in  a  decreased  demand 
for  church  buildings  and  about  everything  else. 

In  an  "inspired"  article  recently  sent  out  by  the 
liquor  interests,  which  pretended  to  show  that  it  was 


The  Saloon  and  Social  Reform     171 

better  for  a  state  to  be  wet  than  dry,  this  statement 
was  made  with  reference  to  the  amount  of  pauperism 
existing  in  wet  and  dry  territory: 

"Dry  Maine  has  945  paupers  and  wet  Rhode 
Island,  the  most  densely  populated  state  in  the 
Union,  has  768." 

To  show  how  apparent  is  the  deception  which  is 
here  attempted,  one  need  but  look  at  the  figures  in 
the  very  next  column  in  the  report  from  which  the 
original  figures  were  copied.  Anybody  who  knows 
anything  at  all  about  the  use  of  statistics  is  aware 
that  it  isn't  fair  to  compare  the  actual  number  of 
paupers  in  one  state  with  the  number  in  any  other 
state.  The  only  honest  method  is  to  compare  the 
percentage,  as  for  example,  the  number  per  100,000 
of  the  population.  To  illustrate : 

In  the  Statistical  Abstract  of  the  United  States  it 
is  shown  that  the  number  of  paupers  in  almshouses 
in  Maine  in  January,  1910,  was  127.3  per  100,000 
of  the  population,  whereas  in  Rhode  Island  it  was 
141.5  per  100,000  of  the  population,  proving  that 
wet  Rhode  Island  actually  has  a  higher  percentage 
of  paupers  than  dry  Maine. 

Furthermore,  Maine  had  reduced  the  number  of 
paupers  in  almshouses  from  175.6  per  100,000  of 
the  population  in  1890  to  127.3  m  J9IOJ  whereas 
Rhode  Island  had  141.8  in  1890  and  141.5  in  1910 
— making  scarcely  any  reduction. 

If  Maine  were  compared  with  her  sister  states  in 
New  England — and  this  would  be  a  fair  test,  in  some 


172  Why  Prohibition! 

ways — the  following  figures  would  indicate  the  situ- 
ation with  reference  to  the  number  of  paupers  in 
almshouses  per  100,000  of  the  population  in  1910: 

New  Hampshire 230.2 

Connecticut    201 .3 

Massachusetts 194-7 

Vermont    107.6 

Maine   127.3 

If  the  nine  states  which  were  dry  prior  to  January, 
I9I5>  were  to  be  compared  with  the  nine  wettest 
states  (including  the  District  of  Columbia)  on  the 
same  date,  the  following  would  indicate  the  number 
of  paupers  in  almshouses  per  100,000  of  the  popu- 
lation in  1910: 

Dry  states 46.5 

Wet  states 127.7 

The  number  of  paupers  in  almshouses  isn't  always 
a  sign  that  people  in  a  given  state  are  poor  because 
they  drink  intoxicants,  because  the  number  of  pau- 
pers may  depend  upon  whether  the  state  is  old  or 
new,  upon  the  predominating  nationality  or  colour  of 
its  inhabitants,  upon  the  general  condition  of  the 
soil,  upon  the  efficiency  or  financial  ability  of  the 
state  officials  in  caring  for  the  poor  within  its  bounds, 
of  whether  there  are  other  methods  of  caring  for 
paupers  besides  using  almshouses.  There  are  many 
other  determining  factors.  But  it  has  been  clearly 
demonstrated,  in  general,  that  as  people  become 


The  Saloon  and  Social  Reform    173 

more  temperate  in  their  habits,  they  are  less  likely  to 
end  their  lives  in  the  poorhouse  and  the  juggled 
figures  of  the  liquor  men  can't  make  us  believe  any- 
thing else. 

In  defence  of  the  booze  business  an  employed  in- 
vestigator declares  that  it  is  not  responsible  for  the 
large  number  of  criminals  which  Prohibitionists  say 
it  produces. 

And  he  seeks  to  justify  his  position  by  saying  that 
after  having  spent  a  month  in  the  Carnegie  Library 
in  Pittsburgh  studying  the  criminal  records  of  the 
world,  he  found  that  56  per  cent,  of  all  criminals 
were  abandoned  in  childhood. 

How  does  it  happen  that  so  large  a  percentage  of 
the  criminal  class  was  abandoned  in  childhood? 
What  kind  of  parents  did  they  have  ? 

I  have  lived  and  laboured  among  the  poorest  peo- 
ple in  our  big  cities  for  thirty  years,  but  I  never  knew 
of  a  case  of  child  abandonment  on  account  of  pov- 
erty. No  doubt  there  have  been  such  cases,  but  they 
are  rare  exceptions.  Usually  a  mother  will  work 
herself  to  death  rather  than  abandon  her  child. 

A  mother  or  father  who  abandons  a  child  is  below 
normal,  and  it  isn't  too  much  to  say  that  such  subnor- 
mality  is  frequently  due  to  drunkenness.  Nobody 
knows,  but  it  would  be  interesting  to  find  out  how 
many  of  the  parents  of  the  56  per  cent,  of  criminals 
who  were  abandoned  in  childhood  were  addicted  to 
drink. 

That  a  drunken  parent  may  easily  start  a  chain  of 


174  Why  Prohibition! 

criminality  and  immorality  is  demonstrated  by  the 
story  of  the  famous  Jukes  family  in  New  York 
State. 

In  1720  the  Jukes  family  consisted  of  a  lazy,  irre- 
sponsible fisherman  and  five  daughters. 

In  five  generations  the  known  descendants  num- 
bered about  1 200  persons,  of  whom  310  were  pro- 
fessional paupers,  living  in  almshouses;  440  were 
physically  wrecked  by  their  own  wickedness;  more 
than  one-half  of  the  women  were  immoral;  130  were 
convicted  criminals;  60  were  habitual  thieves;  7  were 
murderers;  and  300  died  in  infancy. 

Not  one  of  them  had  even  a  common  school  edu- 
cation. Only  20  of  them  learned  a  trade,  and  10  of 
them  learned  it  in  the  state  prison. 

This  family  has  cost  the  state  of  New  York  over 
a  million  dollar's  and  the  cost  is  still  going  on. 

At  about  the  time  that  Jukes,  the  fisherman,  died, 
Jonathan  Edwards — the  New  England  preacher  and 
reformer — left  a  large  family.  In  1900  as  many  as 
1394  of  his  descendants  were  identified.  Of  these, 
13  were  college  presidents;  3  were  United  States 
senators;  65  were  college  professors;  30  were 
judges;  100  were  lawyers — many  of  them  distin- 
guished; 60  were  physicians;  75  were  officers  in  the 
army  and  navy;  100  were  clergymen,  missionaries, 
etc.;  60  were  prominent  authors  and  writers;  295 
were  college  graduates;  80  held  public  offices. 

One  was  a  vice-president  of  the  United  States; 
several  were  governors  of  states,  members  of  Con- 


The  Saloon  and  Social  Reform    175 

gress,  mayors  of  cities,  ministers  to  foreign  courts. 

Fifteen  railroads,  many  banks,  insurance  compan- 
ies and  large  industrial  enterprises  have  been  in- 
debted to  their  management.  Almost  every  depart- 
ment of  social  progress  and  of  public  welfare  have 
felt  the  impulse  of  this  healthy  and  long-lived  family. 

The  relation  of  the  immigrant  to  the  liquor 'prob- 
lem is  a  very  serious  question. 

The  percentage  of  foreign-born  people  in  the 
United  States  is  practically  no  greater  to-day  than 
it  was  in  1860.  The  constant  percentage  for  50 
years  has  been  just  about  14,  and  it  hasn't  varied  I 
per  cent,  from  this  figure  during  all  this  period.  And 
yet  we  have  gotten  the  impression  that  somehow 
this  country  has  been  overrun  by  foreigners.  The 
reason  for  this  lies  in  the  fact  that  foreigners  have 
become  congested  in  certain  states  and  in  most  cities 
— the  strongholds  of  the  saloon. 

Two-thirds  of  the  immigrants  that  land  at  our 
ports  of  entry  go  to  New  York,  New  Jersey,  Penn- 
sylvania and  Massachusetts. 

In  1910  there  were  229  cities  in  the  United  States 
having  a  population  of  25,000  and  over.  These  cities 
contained  3 1  per  cent,  of  the  entire  population  of  this 
country,  but  they  also  contained  56  per  cent,  of  all 
the  foreign-born  whites  in  the  United  States.  Thus, 
while  these  cities  have  less  than  one-third  of  the  peo- 
ple in  the  United  States,  they  contain  more  than  one- 
half  the  foreign-born  people  of  the  entire  country. 

A  study  of  the  dryest  and  wettest  states  indicates 


176  Why  Prohibition! 

that,  generally,  the  wet  states  have  a  large  per- 
centage of  foreign-born,  whereas  the  dry  states  us- 
ually have  a  small  percentage  of  foreign-born. 

Here  are  the  figures  for  the  states  which  were  dry 
prior  to  January,   1915.     The  immigration  figures 

are  from  the  census  of  IQIO: 

Percentage 

of 
Dry  States  Foreign-born 

North  Carolina .3 

Mississippi .5 

Georgia .6 

Tennessee    -9 

Oklahoma 2.4 

West  Virginia   4.7 

Kansas 8.0 

Maine 14.9 

North  Dakota 27.1 

And  here  are  the  percentages  for  the  states  which 

were  wettest  prior  to  January,  1915. 

Percentage 

of 
Wet  States  Foreign-born 

Rhode  Island 33-O 

New  York   30.2 

Connecticut 29.6 

New  Jersey 26.0 

Montana , . . . .     25.2 

Nevada   0 24.1 

Arizona 23.9 

Pennsylvania 18.8 

New  Mexico   7*1 


The  Saloon  and  Social  Reform     177 

However,  the  actual  number  of  foreign-born  in 
these  wet  states  is  ten  times  greater  than  it  is  in  the 
dry  states,  the  figures  being  as  follows : 

Dry  States 550,272 

Wet  States 5,54^,203 

Obviously,  the  anti-saloon  forces  have  an  import- 
ant and  difficult  task  in  educating  our  foreign-born 
citizens  to  vote  against  the  saloon.  But  the  task 
is  hopeful.  And  yet  the  programme  must  be  one 
which  will  frankly  and  courageously  meet  the  condi- 
tions in  industrial  and  immigrant  centres. 

An  elaborated  rural  programme  will  not  suffice. 
The  task  calls  for  statesmanship  of  the  order  which 
is  required  to  solve  all  the  other  great  social  and  eco- 
nomic questions  found  in  our  big  cities  and  industrial 
states. 

It  is  probably  true,  as  a  well-known  booze  de- 
fender persists  in  saying,  that  "the  Prohibition  South 
has  more  poverty  than  the  liberal  North." 

But  the  poverty  of  the  South  is  not  due  to  prohi- 
bition, and  the  brazen  booze  defender  knows  it !  The 
South  was  poor  before  prohibition  was  enacted.  The 
South  has  been  bravely  struggling  since  the  Civil 
War  to  readjust  itself  to  an  entirely  different  eco- 
nomic situation.  It  has  succeeded  to  a  wonderful 
degree. 

The  North  simply  continued  on  its  way  after  the 
war,  in  precisely  the  same  way  as  before,  having 


178  Why  Prohibition! 

already  had  the  advantage  over  the  South  in  com- 
mercial and  industrial  methods. 

The  South  was  compelled  to  carry  along  with  it 
the  great  mass  of  negroes,  who,  when  freed  by  the 
North  were  extremely  poor.  There  are  still  large 
numbers  of  whites  who  live  in  the  mountains  and 
elsewhere,  who  are  reckoned  as  citizens  of  the  South 
who  are  poverty-stricken. 

Prohibition  didn't  make  the  South  poor.  It  found 
the  South  poor  and  it's  going  to  help  make  the  South 
rich.  If  the  men  and  women  of  the  South  were 
persuaded  that  Prohibition  was  a  blight  that  made 
them  poor — and  who  would  know  about  this  better 
than  they? — does  anybody  imagine  that  they  would 
continue  to  vote  themselves  poor? 

That  some  state  federations  of  labour,  some  cen- 
tral labour  bodies,  and  some  international  labour 
unions  are  stultifying  themselves  with  regard  to  a 
most  important  social  question  is  manifested  by  the 
sudden  change  in  their  attitude  toward  woman 
suffrage. 

For  a  generation  organised  labour  has  taken  a 
leading  position  with  reference  to  the  woman  ques- 
tion. It  has  demanded  equal  pay  to  men  and  women 
for  equal  work.  It  has  given  women  the  same  rights 
as  men,  and  has  demanded  of  them  the  same  obli- 
gations that  it  has  demanded  of  men,  within  the  la- 
bour movement. 

One  of  the  declarations  in  the  platform  of  the 


The  Saloon  and  Social  Reform     179 

American  Federation  of  Labor  stands  for  "woman 
suffrage  co-equal  with  man  suffrage." 

Samuel  Gompers  has  declared  himself  with  regard 
to  woman  suffrage  as  follows: 

"Women's  lives  are  affected  by  political  institutions. 
They  ought  to  be  given  the  opportunity  to  participate  in  the 
determination  of  political  affairs  because  their  rights  are 
affected  by  those  determinations.  The  American  Federation 
of  Labor,  recognising  the  necessity  for  complete  freedom  for 
women  wage-earners,  at  its  convention  in  1890  endorsed 
woman  suffrage  and  has  repeatedly  reaffirmed  that  declar- 


John  Mitchell  has  said: 

"Organised  workmen  have  been  practical  and  earnest  ad- 
vocates of  woman  suffrage  for  nearly  a  quarter  of  a  century. 
Workingmen  are  advocates  of  equal  suffrage,  first,  because 
it  is  right  that  all  those  who  bear  the  burdens  and  enjoy  the 
protection  of  government  shall  be  entitled  to  equal  partici- 
pation in  the  affairs  of  the  government ;  second,  because  they 
know  in  a  vital  way  that  without  the  ballot  wage-earning 
women  are  unable  to  protect  themselves  against  the  wrongs 
and  the  unnecessary  hardships  incident  to  and  connected 
with  our  wonderful  industrial  development.  ...  I  believe 
it  is  the  duty  of  the  organised  wage-earners  to  take  the  lead 
and  render  every  assistance  they  can  in  the  movement  for 
the  enfranchisement  of  women." 

Until  within  a  year  or  two  this  clear-cut  position 
on  the  part  of  organised  labour  has  never  been  ques- 
tioned. But  in  various  parts  of  the  country  the 


180  Why  Prohibition! 

liquor  interests  have  become  active  in  their  oppo- 
sition to  woman  suffrage  because  of  their  conviction 
that  if  women  were  given  the  vote  the  saloon  would 
be  abolished.  They  believe  that  woman  suffrage  and 
Prohibition  necessarily  go  hand  in  hand.  This,  of 
course,  is  not  true;  but  nevertheless,  they  have 
brought  their  influence  to  bear  upon  such  labour  lead- 
ers and  labour  organisations  as  they  can  control, 
forcing  them  to  repudiate  the  actions  of  the  Ameri- 
can Federation  of  Labor  with  reference  to  woman 
suffrage. 

Whenever  the  question  of  woman  suffrage  is  pre- 
sented at  a  labour  convention  it  is  invariably  fought 
by  the  unions  connected  with  the  liquor  industries. 
It  is  pathetic  that,  after  having  fought  so  strenu- 
ously for  woman  suffrage  and  having  helped  to  bring 
it  to  the  point  where  it  is  rapidly  being  recognised 
as  just  and  fair  by  the  citizens  of  this  country,  organ- 
ised labour  should  be  deprived  of  the  credit  which 
belongs  to  it  for  having  become  the  advocate  of 
woman  suffrage  long  before  the  political  parties  of 
the  country  dared  stand  sponsor  for  it. 

It  is  unfortunate,  too,  because  organised  labour 
will  lose  the  respect  and  support  of  the  women  in 
industry  who  have  always  looked  to  the  trade  union 
movement  as  an  agency  for  securing  their  emancipa- 
tion from  social,  economic  and  political  injustice. 

This  attitude  on  the  part  of  those  labour  unions 
which  fight  woman  suffrage,  whether  they  be  local  or 
national  in  character,  will  not  be  tolerated  by  the 


The  Saloon  and  Social  Reform    181 

rank  and  file  of  the  men  comprising  the  entire  move- 
ment. 

"I  simply  cannot  permit  these  girls  to  meet  in  a 
hall  that  is  owned  by  a  saloonkeeper;  I  feel  that  I 
am  personally  responsible  for  their  morals,  as  well 
as  their  general  physical  well-being,"  said  the  walk- 
ing delegate  of  a  bookbinders'  union  composed  of  a 
thousand  working  girls,  as  she  told  me  the  story  of 
her  effort  to  secure  a  meeting  hall  for  her  organisa- 
tion. . 

It  appeared  that  she  had  made  arrangements  over 
the  telephone,  with  a  saloonkeeper,  for  the  rental  of 
a  hall  large  enough  to  accommodate  the  members 
of  her  organisation.  And  as  attendance  upon  the 
meetings  of  this  organisation  was  compulsory,  they 
required  a  good-sized  auditorium.  But  when  this 
"labour  leader"  came  to  the  saloon  to  sign  the  con- 
tract and  the  saloonkeeper  discovered  that  he  was 
dealing  with  an  organisation  composed  exclusively 
of  women,  who  in  all  probability  would  not  patronise 
his  bar,  he  raised  the  price  of  the  rent  sixfold,  thus 
making  it  impossible  for  these  women  to  use  this  par- 
ticular meeting  place.  The  saloonkeeper  magnani- 
mously offered  the  use  of  a  very  small  room  on  the 
top  floor  of  the  building,  which  offer  was  promptly 
turned  down. 

And  here  she  was — this  guardian  of  the  morals 
and  the  well-being  of  a  thousand  working  women  of 
a  big  city.  What  was  she  to  do?  Her  organisation 
had  had  no  meeting  for  several  weeks. 


1 82  Why  Prohibition  I 

A  rather  liberal  church — that  is,  liberal  in  its 
methods  of  work — offered  the  use  of  its  main  audi- 
torium for  meetings  to  be  held  monthly  on  Monday 
nights,  from  6  until  8  o'clock,  the  only  charge  being 
that  for  light,  heat  and  janitor  service. 

Why  shouIH  the  women  in  industry  be  compelled 
to  suffer  so  great  a  handicap  by  being  compelled  to 
meet  in  buildings  which  are  dominated  by  a  saloon? 
Can  anything  good  come  out  of  such  an  affiliation? 
Why  should  the  daughters  and  the  sisters  of  work- 
ingmen  be  subjected  to  the  humiliation  of  the  insults 
and  the  signs  of  depravity  which  stare  one  in  the 
face  in  passing  the  open  saloon  door,  when  these 
sisters  and  daughters  are  trying  to  the  best  of  their 
ability  to  raise  their  standards  of  living,  and  to  bet- 
ter their  economic  conditions? 

The  publicity  departments  of  town  booming  asso- 
ciations, real  estate  boards,  Chambers  of  Commerce, 
Merchants'  Associations,  and  other  organisations  of 
business  men,  never  so  much  as  mention  even  the 
best  kind  of  saloons  when  they  try  to  induce  others 
to  move  in  or  to  invest  capital. 

These  organisations  talk  about  the  schools.  They 
are  a  distinct  asset  to  a  community.  But  saloons 
decrease  school  attendance.  Therefore,  the  saloon 
is  a  detriment  to  educational  institutions. 

The  publicity  committees  give  a  prominent  place 
to  the  churches.  But  the  saloon  tries  to  undermine 
the  work  of  the  church,  and,  if  it  were  possible, 
would  destroy  it  altogether. 


The  Saloon  and  Social  Reform    183 

These  business  men  are  proud  of  the  cities'  play- 
grounds. They  enrich  the  lives  of  the  children.  The 
saloon  has  a  tendency  to  take  children  out  of  the 
playgrounds  and  send  them  into  the  factory. 

These  wise  boosters  are  proud  of  the  railroads. 
But  the  saloon  incapacitates  the  workers  on  these 
railroads  to  such  an  extent  as  to  compel  their  mana- 
gers to  prohibit  railroad  men  from  patronising  the 
saloon. 

Indeed  there  is  scarcely  a  single  item  in  the  long 
list  of  "attractions"  of  which  the  average  city  is 
proud,  but  what  the  saloon  and  its  influence  either 
destroys  or  minimises  their  influence  and  effective- 
ness. 

No — no  city  is  proud  of  its  saloons.  They  are 
always  mentioned  with  an  apology.  By  every  pos- 
sible comparison  saloons  show  up  to  a  disadvantage. 
They  do  not  attract  manufacturers  and  families. 

The  only  people  who  are  brought  into  the  city 
by  the  presence  of  saloons  are  almost  invariably  a 
detriment  to  the  city. 

Even  liquor  men  themselves  are  ashamed  of  the 
saloon — why,  then,  should  the  average  citizen  vote 
for  the  saloon? 

The  Department  of  Health  of  the  city  of  New 
York  has  for  several  years  been  conducting  a  definite 
campaign  against  alcohol.  From  all  over  the  coun- 
try strong  commendations  of  this  movement  have 
come  from  medical  and  sociological  societies,  and  in 


i84  Why  Prohibition! 

many  cases,  similar  movements  have  been  inaugu- 
rated by  the  health  departments  of  other  cities. 

It  is  rather  interesting  to  compare  the  opinions  of 
these  organisations,  which  are  interested  in  the  con- 
servation of  human  life  with  the  judgment  of  the 
president  of  the  National  Wholesale  Liquor  Dealers' 
Association,  who  said  in  his  annual  address  that: 

"Liquor  relieves  more  misery  than  it  causes,  pro- 
duces more  joy  than  sorrow, ;  adds  to  efficiency;  is  a 
tonic  for  the  body,  a  stimulant  to  the  mind,  and  a 
preventive  of  crime. " 

But  here's  what  others  say  about  it. 

The  Medical  Society  of  Nova  Scotia: — "Since  it 
has  been  established  that  alcohol  is  not  a  food,  in 
that  none  of  its  elements  is  incorporated  into  the 
tissues,  and  since  the  heat  it  produces  by  oxidation 
is  over-compensated  for  through  heat  lost  from  the 
blood  vessels  of  the  skin,  and  since  alcohol  is  not  re- 
quired to  aid  any  physiological  process,  and  since 
by  its  excessive  use  all  systems  of  the  body  are  in- 
jured and  the  moral  nature  so  altered  as  to  lead  to 
crime,  this  meeting  desires  to  impress  the  community 
with  the  benefits  to  be  obtained  by  abstinence  from 
alcohol  as  a  beverage." 

The  Conference  of  Medical  Health  Officers  of 
Nova  Scotia  passed  the  following  resolution : 

"WHEREAS,  It  has  been  absolutely  proven  that  alcohol  has 
a  pernicious  and  injurious  effect  on  the  public  health  of  our 
country,  in  that  it  lowers  the  resistance  of  the  individual  to 


The  Saloon  and  Social  Reform     185 

disease,  thereby  disposing  to  tuberculosis  and  other  infectious 
diseases;  and, 

"WHEREAS,  It  is  one  of  the  chief  contributing  factors  to 
poverty,  misery  and  crime  ; 

"Therefore,  we,  as  Health  Officers  of  the  Province  of 
Nova  Scotia,  place  ourselves  on  record  as  opposed  to  its  use 
as  a  beverage  and  strongly  recommend  its  use  only  upon 
medical  prescription." 

The  American  Nurses'  Association,  in  its  San 
Francisco  convention  strongly  endorsed  the  Anti- 
Alcohol  campaign  inaugurated  by  the  New  York 
Health  Department,  and  adopted  the  following  reso- 
lution : 

"WHEREAS,  The  American  Nurses*  Association  believes 
that  alcohol  lessens  vital  resistance,  fosters  poverty  and  all 
the  diseases  that  come  from  poverty  hindering  the  progress 
of  the  community;  and, 

"WHEREAS,  The  American  Nurses'  Association  is  firmly 
convinced  that  it  is  the  greatest  cause  of  human  ills ; 

"THEREFORE,  be  it  resolved,  That  the  effort  of  the  New 
York  City  Health  Department  to  establish  a  betterment  of 
public  health  by  conducting  a  systematic,  vigorous  and  defi- 
nite campaign  against  this  acknowledged  evil  be  given  a  full 
and  whole-hearted  endorsement  by  the  American  Nurses' 
Association  assembled  in  San  Francisco." 

W.  Frank  Persons,  director  of  the  Charity  Organ- 
isation Society  of  New  York,  in  commenting  upon 
the  propaganda  engaged  in  by  the  Health  Depart- 
ment, said: 


1 86  Why  Prohibition! 

"I  have  been  delighted  to  read  of  your  intention  to  con- 
duct an  educational  campaign  against  the  drink  habit.  A 
survey  of  the  field  is  warranted  on  the  consideration  of  pub- 
lic health  alone.  I  feel  sure  that  the  public  is  ready  to  sup- 
port earnestly  and  effectively  the  work  of  the  Department  of 
Health  along  this  line." 

Dr.  Frank  Crane,  in  an  editorial  in  the  New  York 
Globe,  wrote  as  follows: 

1  At  last  the  alcoholic  question  is  getting  around  to  the 
right  basis.  It  is  being  considered  as  a  matter  of  public 
health  and  not  of  public  morals.  It  is  getting  away  from 
the  preachers  and  into  the  hands  of  the  doctors.  .  .  . 

"Let  the  health  authorities  of  all  cities  follow  the  lead  of 
those  in  New  York  City  and  declare  that  the  matter  is  to 
be  taken  up  solely  as  a  question  of  public  health  and  they 
will  have  the  support  of  the  level-headed  common  people." 

Here  is  an  item  from  the  Weekly  Bulletin  of  the 
Department  of  Health  of  the  city  of  New  York: 

"It  is  conceded  that  alcohol  is  not  a  real  brain  stimulant, 
but  acts  by  narrowing  the  field  of  consciousness.  By  grad- 
ually overcoming  the  higher  brain  elements  the  activities  of 
the  lower  ones  are  released,  hence  the  subjective  stimula- 
tion and  the  lack  of  judgment  and  common  sense  often 
shown  by  those  even  slightly  under  the  influence  of  alcohol." 

Professor  Irving  Fisher,  the  eminent  teacher  of 
sociology  at  Yale  University,  says: 

"Whatever  degree  of  power  alcohol  still  possesses  is  kept 
alive  chiefly  by  the  force  or  inertia  of  old  traditions,  by  the 


The  Saloon  and  Social  Reform     187 

assumption  that  so  prevalent  a  practice  must  have  virtues, 
by  the  fear  of  individuals  to  break  away  from  custom,  and 
by  the  well-known  difficulty  of  emancipating  one's  self  from 
any  drug  habit.  If  we  look  at  the  alcohol-habit  squarely, 
we  see  that  it  is  merely  one  of  the  harmful  drug  habits, 
like  opium  in  China,  hasheesh  in  Turkey,  cocaine,  etc. 
Alcohol  is  a  poison,  and  its  evil  effects  are  so  great  that  every 
courageous  man  should  help  to  eliminate  them." 

Whose  judgment  shall  we  follow?  The  president 
of  the  National  Wholesale  Liquor  Dealers'  Associa- 
tion, or  that  of  physicians,  nurses,  sociologists,  busi- 
ness men,  newspaper  editors,  charity  organisation 
workers  and  Boards  of  Health? 

The  Social  Workers'  Club  in  Minneapolis  voted 
unanimously  in  favour  of  the  drys  in  the  recent  fight 
on  the  saloon  in  that  city.  The  members  of  this 
club  represented  the  leading  social  agencies  in  Min- 
neapolis, most  of  them  being  the  officials  of  their 
organisations  and  acknowledged  to  be  among  the 
most  efficient  experts  on  social  problems  in  this 
country. 

This  action  of  the  social  workers  in  Minneapolis 
is  characteristic  of  the  men  and  women  everywhere 
who  are  responsible  for  the  physical,  industrial  and 
moral  welfare  of  the  depressed  in  our  big  cities.  No- 
body knows  quite  so  well  as  they  do  how  much  of  the 
sufferings  of  the  poor  may  be  charged  up  against 
the  saloon. 

It  is  their  sole  business  to  study  in  a  scientific  and 
yet  in  a  sympathetic  manner  the  causes  of  social 


188  Why  Prohibition! 

evils.  They  have  no  other  ends  to  serve  than  the 
well-being  of  those  who  for  any  reason  whatsoever 
are  being  deprived  of  the  best  things  in  human  life. 

Unquestionably,  these  social  workers  recognise 
the  need  for  recreation  and  relaxation  among  work- 
ingmen  and  working  women.  If  they  felt  that  the 
saloon  supplies  this  need  better  than  any  other  agency 
there  is  no  doubt  that  they  would  unhesitatingly  say 
so. 

But  they  don't!  Quite  the  contrary.  They  are 
saying  most  emphatically  that  much  of  the  suffering 
of  those  in  whom  they  are  interested  is  due  to  the 
influence  of  the  saloon. 

Therefore,  they  are  opposed  to  the  saloon. 

It  is  a  favourite  argument  of  the  liquor  men  that 
the  use  of  liquor  has  a  great  social  value — that  it 
brings  out  the  repressed  or  suppressed  characteristics 
of  many  noble  souls. 

And  so  they  insist  that  Prohibition  must  not  pre- 
vail because  it  restricts  the  men  whose  "personalities 
are  expanding." 

I've  seen  such  fellows — haven't  you?  They  were 
some  personalities!  Sometimes  it  required  only  a 
couple  of  glasses  of  booze  to  produce  the  state  of 
"expansion,"  and  then,  again,  it  required  a  quart. 

They  expanded  so  greatly  that  they  required  the 
entire  sidewalk  to  navigate.  Often  nobody  else 
could — or  would — remain  in  the  same  room  with 
them.  When  some  men  have  gotten  into  this  state 
of  "expansion,"  they  wanted  the  "personal  liberty" 


The  Saloon  and  Social  Reform     189 

of  wiping  up  the  earth  with  anybody  who  happened 
along  conveniently.  Often  they  imagined  themselves 
to  be  millionaires,  or  kings,  or  even  presidents. 

It  would  be  a  great  injustice  to  restrict  such  "noble 
souls."  The  development  of  "individual  character- 
istics" which  impels  these  unfettered  ones  to  "live 
their  own  lives"  must  not  be  interfered  with,  no — not 
by  a  jug-full. 

But — there  are  really  some  other  considerations. 


IX 

Liquor  and  the  Length  of  Life 

IN  Europe,  during  350  years  the  length  of  life 
increased  from  an  average  of  twenty  years  to  about 
forty  years.  With  scarcely  an  exception  men  and 
women  in  every  country  are  living  longer  than  for- 
merly. Only  here  and  there  is  a  country  which  seems 
to  be  almost  stationary  in  this  respect.  In  India,  for 
example,  the  length  of  life  is  almost  the  same  as  it 
was  three  hundred  and  fifty  years  ago,  the  average 
duration  of  life  to-day  being  about  twenty-five  years. 

But  wherever  the  light  of  modern  civilisation  has 
gone,  there  men  have  been  fulfilling  the  plan  of  their 
Creator,  with  regard  to  a  larger  and  longer  life. 

In  Sweden,  the  expectation  of  life  at  birth  is  fifty- 
one  years;  in  France  it  is  forty-six  years;  in  England 
and  Wales  forty-four  years;  in  Italy  forty-three 
years;  in  the  United  States  it  is  about  forty-five  years. 

Life  has  been  lengthened  in  several  leading  coun- 
tries as  follows:  The  annual  death  rate  in  Austria 
during  1881  to  1885  was  30  per  thousand;  in  1912 
it  was  only  20  per  thousand.  In  England  and  Wales 
it  decreased  during  this  period  from  19  per  thousand 
to  13  per  thousand;  in  Hungary  from  33  to  23;  in 

190 


Liquor  and  the  Length  of  Life     191 

Italy  from  27  to  18 ;  in  Spain  from  33  to  22;  in  the 
United  States  the  death  rate  decreased  from  20  to 
about  13  from  1880  to  1916. 

This  struggle  for  life  is  in  harmony  with  the  pur- 
pose of  Jesus,  who  said  that  He  came  that  men  might 
have  life  and  that  they  might  have  it  "more  abun- 
dantly." There  are  some  who  say  that  this  refer- 
ence to  "life"  has  to  do  simply  with  "spiritual  life," 
but  this  is  manifestly  absurd,  when  one  stops  to  con- 
sider that  Jesus  himself  spent  a  large  part  of  his  time 
healing  the  sick  so  that  they  might  have  a  more 
abundant  life.  And  when  He  fed  the  hungry  He  did 
so  because  of  the  same  motive. 

It  must  therefore  be  pleasing  to  God  that  His  chil- 
dren have  diligently  sought  to  have  life  extended  and 
enriched,  and  whatever  has  this  for  its  purpose 
should  be  encouraged,  and  whoever  assists  in  this 
task  is  a  benefactor  to  the  human  race  and  is  carry- 
ing out  the  will  of  God  in  the  world. 

By  the  same  token,  whatever  and  whoever  works 
in  opposition  to  this  supreme  purpose  is  a  curse  to 
mankind  and  should  be  condemned. 

It  isn't  so  long  ago  that  in  England  there  were 
over  two  hundred  "crimes"  which  were  punishable 
by  death.  To-day,  all  the  tendencies  are  toward  the 
humanising  of  our  treatment  of  the  "criminal."  To 
read  the  stories  of  the  official  murder  of  even  little 
children  during  this  earlier  period  because  of  an 
alleged  "crime,"  is  heart  rending.  Now  we  regard 
even  the  worst  criminal  capable  of  redemption,  pro- 


192  Why  Prohibition! 

Vided  that  we  succeed  in  establishing  a  point  of  con- 
tact with  the  good  that  is  in  him.  That  an  occa- 
sional ungrateful  man  disappoints  the  forward-look- 
ing warden  of  a  penitentiary  is  no  indication  that  the 
modern  method  of  dealing  with  criminals  is  wrong; 
it  would  be  fairer  to  point  to  the  thousands  who  have 
been  raised  to  self-respect  and  honour  through  this 
method. 

There  was  a  time  when  great  epidemics  swept  over 
the  country,  and  men,  women  and  children  died  by 
the  thousands.  And  even  some  pious  folks  declared 
that  this  was  a  "dispensation"  of  Providence.  But 
God  intends  that  men  should  have  life,  not  death. 
It  is  not  His  will  that  any  should  perish.  No— we 
can't  charge  it  up  to  the  Almighty.  It  might  be 
more  reasonable  to  charge  it  up  to  the  board  of 
health.  To  the  doctors  and  sanitary  experts  who 
have  done  so  much  to  decrease  the  possibility  of  epi- 
demics, we  are  increasingly  grateful. 

Others  insisted  that  this  systematic  decimation  of 
the  human  race  was  a  great  economic  factor,  or- 
dained of  God,  because  these  wise  men  believed  that 
there  was  danger  that  the  number  of  people  on  earth 
might  become  too  great.  They  said  as  inexorable 
law  had  decreed  that  the  increase  of  mankind  was 
in  geometrical  proportions,  and  whereas  the  increase 
of  food  products  was  only  in  arithmetical  propor- 
tions,' therefore  the  time  must  come  when  it  would 
be  impossible  to  feed  all  these  people  and  so  God 
mercifully  killed  them  off,  periodically. 


Liquor  and  the  Length  of  Life     193 

Fortunately,  just  at  the  right  time  in  the  history  of 
the  human  race,  men  were  raised  up  whom  we  called 
agricultural  experts  or  specialists,  while  others  in- 
vented agricultural  machinery,  and  they're  going  to 
settle  this  food  question  for  us,  thereby  making  the 
rest  of  us  debtors  to  them. 

It  isn't  so  long  ago  that  some  men  believed  that 
it  was  necessary  to  compel  little  children  to  work 
in  factories  under  bad  conditions,  in  order  to  "save" 
certain  industries.  But  to-day  most  of  us  have  a 
strong  conviction  that  it  is  better  to  save  children 
than  to  save  industries.  We  are  convinced  that  any 
industry  which  requires  the  sacrifice  of  children  upon 
its  altar — merely  to  win  gold — has  no  right  to  live. 
Therefore,  we  take  off  our  hats  to  the  national 
committees  and  local  committees  which  are  loyally 
fighting  to  lengthen  the  life  of  little  children. 

To-day  we  no  longer  talk  merely  about  the  "sur- 
vival of  the  fittest" :  we  are  also  concerned  about 
the  "revival  of  the  unfit."  It  is  largely  due  to  this 
fact  that  the  average  length  of  life  has  so  greatly 
increased.  The  poorest  people  in  the  tenements 
of  our  big  cities  may  have  the  services  without 
charge  of  the  greatest  specialists  in  the  medical  world 
— in  so  far  as  this  is  humanly  possible.  Great  in- 
stitutions have  been  built  almost  exclusively  for  the 
benefit  of  the  masses  of  the  people,  so  that  their  lives 
may  be  lengthened  and  enriched. 

When  it  is  confidently  asserted  by  scientists  that 
the  length  of  life  in  the  United  States  could  easily 


194  Why  Prohibition! 

be  increased  from  45  to  60  years — and  that  this 
may  be  done  within  a  generation — the  statement  is 
hailed  with  delight,  for  15  years  added  to  one's  life 
gives  one  an  opportunity  for  greater  service,  per- 
mitting men  and  women  to  enjoy  for  a  longer  period 
the  fruits  of  the  continually  increasing  time  required 
to  prepare  for  their  life's  work.  If  health  and 
length  of  life  are  so  great  factors  in  the  life  of  the 
individual  as  well  as  the  nation,  then  anything  that 
undermines  these  should  be  removed. 

In  arriving  at  safe  conclusions  regarding  the  in- 
fluence of  the  liquor  business,  in  so  far  as  it  affects 
the  length  of  human  life,  it  is  no  longer  necessary 
to  depend  upon  the  "questionable  figures'*  of  tem- 
perance agitators,  nor  to  be  swayed  by  their  "emo- 
tional appeals."  The  exact  consequences  to  us, 
as  a  nation,  of  the  manufacture  and  sale  of  intoxi- 
cating liquor  are  now  being  determined  by  statisti- 
cians— experts  who  are  guided  by  hard,  cold  diag- 
noses of  ascertained  facts — who  eliminate  sentiment, 
and  look  only  for  scientific  results. 

Therefore,  when  we  are  informed  by  these  men 
that  the  equivalent  of  the  working  lives  of  60,000 
men  engaged  in  the  liquor  business  is  destroyed  in 
each  generation,  it's  worth  while  to  pay  attention. 

For  this  means,  in  substance,  that  the  liquor  in- 
dustry wipes  out  among  its  workers  in  each  genera- 
tion the  equivalent  of  all  the  married  men  in  a  city 
about  the  size  of  Indianapolis,  Jersey  City,  Kansas 
City,  Minneapolis,  New  Orleans,  or  Washington, 


Liquor  and  the  Length  of  Life     195 

D.  C.,  or  the  average  city  of  about  300,000  popu- 
lation. Indeed,  it  is  as  though  they  never  existed. 

Thomas  Oliver,  who  is  the  world's  authority  on 
dangerous  trades,  has  shown  us  that  in  England  the 
death  rate  of  brewery  workers  between  the  ages 
of  35  and  65  is  50  per  cent,  higher  than  it  is  among 
all  occupied  males.  But  in  America  the  figures  are 
even  higher. 

Recently  forty-three  life  insurance  companies  in 
the  United  States  and  Canada  made  an  investigation 
of  the  comparative  mortality  of  various  groups,  in- 
cluding hundreds  of  different  kinds  of  occupations. 
The  study  is  known  as  the  Medico-Actuarial  Mor- 
tality Investigation — Arthur  Hunter,  Actuary  of  the 
New  York  Life  Insurance  Company,  being  the  chair- 
man of  the  committee  having  the  work  in  charge. 
The  companies  in  question  supplied  their  records  for 
a  study  of  about  two  million  lives,  covering  a  period 
of  25  years.  This  was  the  largest  and  most  com- 
prehensive investigation  of  its  kind  ever  undertaken 
by  life  insurance  companies  anywhere.  It  required 
three  and  a  half  years  of  continuous  labour  to  fin- 
ish the  study.  It  should  be  borne  in  mind  that  the 
statistics  produced  in  this  investigation  were  not  got- 
ten together  for  the  purpose  of  serving  as  total  ab- 
stinence arguments  to  be  employed  by  temperance 
agitators.  They  were  gotten  out  for  practical  use 
in  a  great  business  which  is  conducted  upon  scien- 
tific principles.  The  work  was  done  by  actuaries 
and  medical  directors  of  national  reputation,  whose 


196  Why  Prohibition! 

knowledge  of  mortality  statistics  is  based  upon  their 
experience  with  all  sorts  of  men  and  women. 

The  very  existence  of  life  insurance  companies 
depends  upon  securing  unew  business."  It  is  not  to 
their  advantage  to  exclude  anybody  who  may  be 
insurable.  Therefore,  the  statements  given  by  these 
men  as  to  the  probable  length  of  life  of  a  particular 
group  are  worthy  of  respect.  The  cases  studied  by 
these  experts  included  among  others,  men  engaged 
in  the  following  occupations:  proprietors,  superin- 
tendents and  managers  who  attended  bar  in  hotels; 
proprietors  and  managers  who  attended  bar  in  bil- 
liard rooms,  pool  rooms  and  bowling  alleys;  pro- 
prietors, managers  and  superintendents  of  brewer- 
ies; foremen,  maltsters  and  brewery  workers  in  gen- 
eral; proprietors,  superintendents  and  managers  of 
restaurants  with  bars;  waiters  in  hotels,  restaurants 
and  clubs  where  liquor  is  served,  and  proprietors  of 
groceries  with  bars. 

According  to  the  statistics  furnished  by  the  life 
insurance  companies,  the  death  rate  of  brewery 
workers  in  this  country  is  52  per  cent,  higher  than 
the  "expected  deaths";  while  that  of  waiters  in  res- 
taurants, hotels  and  clubs  where  liquor  is  served 
is  77  per  cent,  higher  than  the  "expected  deaths." 
Saloon  proprietors  and  managers  who  attend  bar 
have  an  "extra  mortality"  of  78  per  cent.  The 
method  of  arriving  at  these  percentages  was  as 
follows : 


Liquor  and  the  Length  of  Life     197 

Taking  the  case  of  saloon  proprietors  and  man- 
agers insured  during  the  period  of  the  study,  there 
should  have  been  among  these  479  deaths,  this  be- 
ing the  normal  number  of  "expected  deaths."  But 
there  were  actually  830  deaths  among  this  groupr-^ 
the  ratio  of  "actual"  to  "expected  deaths"  being  173 
per  cent.,  or  73  per  cent,  of  "extra  mortality"  (100 
standing  for  the  "expected"  number  of  deaths). 

Among  hotel  proprietors,  superintendents  and 
managers  who  attend  bar,  the  death  rate  from  cir- 
rhosis of  the  liver  was  six  times  the  normal;  from 
diabetes  and  Bright's  disease,  three  times  the  nor- 
mal, and  from  apoplexy,  heart  disease  and  pneumo- 
nia, twice  the  normal.  Unquestionably  some  of  the 
excess  mortality  among  those  engaged  in  the  liquor 
trade  is  due  to  long  hours  and  to  unsanitary  con- 
ditions, but  the  greater  part  of  the  excess  mortality 
is  due  to  their  contact  with  alcohol  in  its  various 
forma.  At  any  rate,  the  lives  of  these  men  were 
shortened  because  they  were  engaged  in  the  liquor 
business,  no  matter  what  the  immediate  causes  of 
death  may  have  been.  It  should  be  remembered  that 
the  insured  were  men  who  were  the  best  of  their 
kind,  for,  as  is  well  known,  the  various  life  insur- 
ance companies  require  applicants  for  insurance  to 
come  up  to  a  fairly  high  physical  standard.  That 
the  death  rate  among  some  other  workers  is  also 
in  excess  of  the  average  death  rate  for  all  occupied 
males  is  not  an  argument  in  favour  of  the  liquor 


198  Why  Prohibition! 

business.  The  liquor  industry  cannot  hide  behind 
others1  sins. 

As  already  stated,  there  are  about  300,000  men 
engaged  in  various  forms  of  the  liquor  business  who 
lose  an  average  of  six  years  of  life,  or  a  total  of 
1,800,000  years.  Assuming  that  their  wages,  sal- 
aries and  profits  average  $1,000  a  year  each,  it 
would  mean  substantially  that  there  is  a  dead  loss 
of  $1,800,000,000  to  every  generation  of  workers 
in  this  group.  This  sum  of  money  almost  equals  the 
annual  drink  bill  of  the  United  States,  about  $2,000,- 
000,000  being  spent  for  liquor.  It  is  about  50  per 
cent,  greater  than  what  is  said,  by  the  liquor  men 
themselves,  to  be  invested  in  the  entire  liquor  busi- 
ness in  the  United  States,  including  the  capital  in- 
vested in  brewing,  distilling,  wine-making  and  malt- 
ing; the  capital  invested  in  the  entire  retail  business, 
including  fixtures  and  furnishings,  and  in  what  is 
known  as  the  "allied  industries,"  such  as  cooper 
shops,  bottle  factories,  etc.,  for  all  these  enterprises 
have  invested  in  them  only  about  $1,294,000,000. 

The  men  engaged  in  the  liquor  business,  there- 
fore, make  a  contribution  every  twenty  years,  in  the 
terms  of  life,  of  the  equivalent  of  enough  money  to 
entirely  re-establish  the  liquor  business.  It  must  be 
apparent  that  the  curse  of  liquor  rests  upon  the 
maker  and  seller  of  intoxicants,  as  well  as  upon  the 
user  of  strong  drink. 

In  the  discussion  with  regard  to  the  relation  of 
the  workingmen  to  the  liquor  traffic,  it  is  constantly 


Liquor  and  the  Length  of  Life     199 

being  said  that  the  liquor  industry  pays  a  higher  rate 
of  wages  than  some  other  industries.  This  may  be 
true  in  some  instances.  But  what  does  it  profit  a 
man — and  particularly  his  family — if,  in  order  to 
obtain  a  couple  of  dollars  more  per  week  in  wages, 
he  is  compelled  to  make  a  contribution  of  six  years 
of  life,  besides  being  unable  to  insure  his  life  for 
the  benefit  of  his  family,  for  no  standard  life  insur- 
ance company  will  now  accept  as  risks  men  engaged 
in  the  liquor  business* — although  two  or  three  will  do 
so  at  a  greatly  advanced  premium  rate  and  with  cer- 
tain other  restrictions. 

What  about  the  ordinary  users  of  intoxicating 
liquor?  The  Medico-Actuarial  Mortality  Investiga- 
tion undoubtedly  demonstrated  that  the  steady  use 
of  alcoholic  beverages  or  occasional  excesses  are  det- 
rimental to  the  individual,  and  that  the  total  ab- 
stainers from  alcohol  live  longer  than  those  who  use 
it.  Even  those  who  would  be  regarded  as  "moder- 
ate drinkers"  lose  an  average  of  four  years  of  their 
lives.  It  may  be  that  some  "jolly  good  fellow"  will 
say  that  it  is  worth  losing  four  years  of  one's  life  to 
have  a  "good  time"  by  drinking  beer  and  whiskey 
when  he  pleases.  But  he  should  not  forget  that  the 
average  loss  of  life  is  four  years.  He,  himself,  may 
lose  15  years  because  of  his  indiscretion. 

The  men  in  question  were  not  considered  immod- 
erate drinkers  at  the  date  of  application,  nor  was 
their  standing  in  the  community  bad.  They  were 


2OO  Why  Prohibition! 

all  men  considered  by  the  insurance  companies  to 
be  entitled  to  policies,  without  paying  extra  pre- 
miums, their  habits  not  being  regarded  as  a  serious 
detriment. 

The  causes  of  death  showed  that  the  death  rate 
from  cirrhosis  of  the  liver  was  five  times  the  normal; 
and  from  diabetes,  tuberculosis,  pneumonia  and  sui- 
cide, twice  the  normal. 

It  should  be  said  that,  in  the  opinion  of  some 
students  of  this  question,  the  mortality  among  men 
who  are  total  abstainers  from  alcohol  is  practically 
the  same  as  that  of  men  who  are  total  abstainers 
from  tobacco,  and  that,  generally  speaking,  the  same 
body  of  men  are  included  in  these  two  classes. 
There  are  other  factors  which  enter  into  this  mat- 
ter— abstainers  are  proportionately  oftener  found 
in  non-hazardous  occupations  than  in  hazard- 
ous. For  example,  a  larger  proportion  of  clergy- 
men are  found  among  abstainers  than  among  mod- 
erate drinkers;  the  conditions  which  surround  the 
home  life  may  be  better  among  abstainers  than 
among  non-abstainers;  the  abstainer  is  probably  ab- 
stemious in  his  eating.  It  has  also  been  observed 
that  those  who  are  total  abstainers  are  so  because 
they  are  vigorous  and  active,  and  do  not  feel  the 
necessity  for  stimulants;  whereas  those  who  are  not 
total  abstainers  may  not  be  their  equal  in  physique. 

However,  Mr.  Hunter,  the  Actuary  of  the  New 
York  Life  Insurance  Company,  has  said:  "I  have 


Liquor  and  the  Length  of  Life    201 

been  in  the  actuarial  profession  for  over  20  years, 
and  have  had  the  opportunity  of  studying  not  only 
the  published  statistics,  but  many  private  investiga- 
tions. I  cannot  recall  a  single  large  class  of  men 
or  women,  using  alcohol  freely,  but  not  immoder- 
ately, at  the  date  of  application  for  insurance,  or 
who  had  used  it  in  excess  formerly,  and  were  now 
temperate,  that  did  not  have  a  higher  mortality  than 
the  normal.  While  I  am  not  a  total  abstainer,  I 
am  convinced  it  would  be  immeasurably  better  for 
this,  or  any  other  country,  to  have  the  production 
and  sale  of  alcoholic  liquors  abolished  if  it  were 
practicable.  The  advantages  claimed  for  alcohol 
are  a  small  offset  in  my  judgment  to  the  evils  which 
proceed  from  its  use  and  its  abuse.  The  effect  of 
prohibition  of  the  manufacture  and  sale  of  alco- 
holic beverages  in  Russia  must  be  such  that  the  sav- 
ing in  human  life,  alone,  will  be  enormous.  The 
loss  of  500,000  men  as  a  result  of  the  present  war 
could  be  made  good  in  less  than  ten  years  through 
complete  abstinence  from  alcoholic  beverages  in 
Russia." 

The  increase  in  the  length  of  life  which  has  come 
to  mankind  as  a  whole  during  the  past  50  years  is 
practically  nullified  for  those  who  are  engaged  in 
the  liquor  business,  as  well  as  for  those  who  use 
intoxicants,  even  moderately.  Such  great  havoc  and 
destruction  of  life  does  the  liquor  business  create. 

Speaking  at  the   First  National   Conference   on 


202  Why  Prohibition! 

Race  Betterment  at  Battle  Creek,  Michigan,  Mr. 
Hunter  said: 

"It  may  interest  abstainers  to  know  that  in  1840  an 
application  was  received  by  an  English  insurance  company 
for  a  policy  on  the  life  of  an  abstainer,  and  the  directors  of 
the  company  decided  to  charge  10  per  cent,  more  than  the 
ordinary  premium  because  they  looked  upon  the  applicant 
as  'thin  and  watery,  and  as  mentally  cranked  in  that  he 
repudiated  the  good  creatures  of  God  as  found  in  alcoholic 
drinks/  As  the  result  of  this  action,  he,  with  his  friends, 
founded  the  first  temperance  insurance  company  in  Britain, 
and  himself  lived  to  the  age  of  82. 

"There  has  been  published  only  one  comparison  between 
abstainers  and  non-abstainers,  based  on  the  experience  among 
the  insured  in  an  American  company,  and  this  was  presented 
by  the  New  England  Mutual  Life  Insurance  Company.  The 
insured  were  divided  into  four  classes:  (i)  Total  ab- 
stainer; (2)  Rarely  use;  (3)  Temperate;  and  (4)  Mod- 
erate. The  standard  used  in  testing  the  mortality  was  the 
American  Table,  which  is  generally  the  basis  for  the  calcu- 
lation of  premiums.  The  following  shows  the  approximate 
percentages  of  that  table: 

Total  abstainer 59% 

Rarely  use 71  % 

Temperate  84% 

Moderate 125% 

"According  to  the  above  table,  the  moderate  drinkers  had 
twice  as  high  a  mortality  as  the  total  abstainers." 

The  following  is  a  synopsis  of  the  published  ex- 
perience of  insurance  companies  in  other  English- 
speaking  countries : 


Liquor  and  the  Length  of  Life    203 

Mortality  of  General  Approximate  ex- 
or  Non-Abstainer  cess  of  mortal- 
Section  compared  ity  among 
with  that  of  Ab-  Non-Abstain- 
stainer  Section.  ers  over  Ab- 

stainers. 

United  Kingdom  Temperance 
and  General  Provident  In- 
stitution (England),  expe- 
rience from  1866  to  1910. . .  135%  35% 

Sceptre  Life  Assurance  Com- 
pany (England),  experience 
from  1884  to  1910 150%;  50% 

Scottish  Temperance  Life  As- 
surance Company  (.Scot- 
land), experience  from  1883 
to  1907  140%  40% 

Australian  Temperance  and 
General  Life  Assurance  So- 
ciety (Australia),  experience 
from  1900  to  1910 160%  60% 

Manufacturers  Life  Insurance 
Company  (Canada),  experi- 
ence from  1902  to  1910 175%  75% 

"From  the  non-abstainer  section  were  excluded  those  who 
were  known  to  drink  immoderately  at  the  date  of  application 
for  insurance." 

In  an  interesting  article  in  The  Outlook,  Samuel1 
Wilson  answers  the  question  "Is  Moderate  Drinking 
Justified ?"  Interrogating  forty  life  insurance  com- 
panies as  to  their  attitude  toward  insuring  liquor 
dealers  and  liquor  drinkers,  he  discovered  that  every 
reputable  company  either  refuses  entirely  to  insure 


204  Why  Prohibition! 

liquor  dealers  or  treats  them  as  an  hazardous  class, 
imposing  upon  them  an  extra  premium. 

One  prominent  eastern  company  wrote  that  re- 
tail liquor  dealers,  employes  in  distilleries,  grocers 
having  a  bar,  saloonkeepers  and  bartenders,  as  well 
as  travelling  salesmen  for  liquor  houses  are  all 
excluded. 

A  Philadelphia  company  answered: 

"We  do  not  accept  any  liquor  dealers,  and  only  a  limited 
number  of  those  who  are  brewers  or  wholesale  dealers — we 
prefer  total  abstainers  to  those  who  imbibe  even  moderately." 

A  Southern  company  said : 

"This  Company  does  not  insure  the  lives  of  persons  en- 
gaged in  the  sale  or  manufacture  of  intoxicating  liquors." 

A  Canadian  company  answers: 

"The  practice  of  this  company  is  to  require  an  extra  pre- 
mium wherever  an  applicant  is  engaged  in  the  manufacture 
or  sale  of  intoxicating  liquors.  The  extra  premium  as  a 
rule  is  $10.00  per  $1,000  insurance." 

"We  do  not  write  saloonkeepers,  bartenders,  pro- 
prietors of  hotels  where  the  bar  is  a  prominent  fea- 
ture of  the  hotel  business,  brewers  or  liquor  sales- 
men, except  that  we  sometimes  write  wholesale  liquor 
dealers  who  do  not  themselves  drink  or  have  direct 
charge  of  the  stock,"  is  the  reply  of  a  prominent 
company  in  the  middle  west,  located  in  a  city  in 


Liquor  and  the  Length  of  Life    205 

which  brewers  and  saloonkeepers  are  a  great  po- 
litical power. 

From  everywhere  the  answers  were  substantially 
the  same — liquor  dealers  and  liquor  drinkers  are  un- 
desirable from  the  viewpoint  of  life  insurance  com- 
panies. The  experts  employed  by  these  companies 
to  study  the  factors  which  influence  the  duration  of 
life  have  given  their  verdict — plainly  it  is  to  the  ef- 
fect that  alcohol  is  a  poison  and  they  have  decided 
that  men  who  use  it  are  bad  risks. 

Logically,  therefore,  those  who  dispense  it  and 
institutions  in  which  it  is  sold,  are  a  detriment  to 
human  welfare.  When  enough  people  believe  with 
these  scientific  business  men,  then  the  use  of  liquor 
will  cease. 

A  notable  address  before  the  convention  of  Public 
Health  Officials  and  the  Massachusetts  Association 
of  Boards  of  Health,  on  April  29,  1915,  by  Dr. 
Charles  W.  Eliot  included  the  following  statements: 

"The  next  evil  which  should  be  attacked  with  the  utmost 
vigour  by  all  boards  of  health  is  alcoholism.  Public  opinion 
needs  to  be  enlightened  on  two  points  with  regard  to  the  use 
of  alcohol  as  a  beverage. 

"In  the  first  place,  it  should  be  brought  home  to  the  entire 
population  that  the  habitual  use  of  alcoholic  beverages  re- 
duces, in  a  serious  degree,  the  productive  efficiency  of  the 
community. 

"In  the  second  place,  recent  experiments  on  the  effects 
of  alcohol  on  the  nerves  and  glands  of  the  human  body  have 


2o6  Why  Prohibition! 

demonstrated  beyond  a  doubt  that  alcohol  invariably  does 
harm,  and  never  any  good  either  in  health  or  disease.  The 
use  of  alcohol  as  a  defense  against  exposure  or  fatigue  has 
been  given  up  by  all  sensible  persons.  .  .  . 

"This  evil  is  rooted,  first,  in  what  are  called  vested  inter- 
ests— that  is,  in  the  investment  of  large  amounts  of  capital 
in  the  plants  which  produce,  store,  and  distribute  beers, 
wines,  and  spirits,  and  secondly,  in  the  methods  of  taxation 
to  which  the  white  nations  are  accustomed.  Heretofore 
the  medical  profession  and  the  public  health  officers  have 
given  an  uncertain  sound  concerning  the  use  of  alcohol.  .  .  . 

"It  remains  for  the  boards  of  health  to  attack  this  hideous 
evil  with  the  weapons  and  in  the  spirit  of  preventive  medi- 
cine. They  should  bring  to  the  work  all  recent  knowledge 
concerning  the  effects  of  alcohol  on  the  human  body,  call  to 
their  aid  legislators  who  can  find  equivalents  for  the  public 
revenue  now  derived  from  the  manufacture  and  sale  of  al- 
coholic drinks,  and  re-enforce  to  the  utmost  the  wise  coun- 
sellors who  by  moral  teachings  have  brought  about  during 
the  past  fifty  years  considerable  improvements  in  regard  to 
the  use  of  alcohol  in  the  more  intelligent  and  conscientious 
classes.  .  .  . 

"The  responsibility  of  physicians  and  boards  of  health  in 
regard  to  the  advice  they  give  to  young  people  on  these  mat- 
ters is  heavy  indeed;  and  so  is  their  responsibility  on  these 
subjects  towards  legislatures,  municipal  governments,  courts, 
and  state  executives." 

And  Dr.  Haven  Emerson,  then  Commissioner  of 
Health  in  New  York  City,  said  in  an  address  deliv- 
ered before  the  General  Sessions  of  the  American 


Liquor  and  the  Length  of  Life    207 

Public  Health  Association,  Cincinnati,  Ohio,  Octo- 
ber 24,  1916. 

"Alcohol  causes  a  lowered  resistance  to  communicable  dis- 
eases, to  infections,  and  in  addition  to  the  clinical  experience 
generally  accepted,  there  are  certain  facts  which  add  specific 
evidence  to  the  general  proposition.  Clinical  experience  is 
unanimous  on  these  points,  but  clinical  experience  has  not 
been  acquired  or  written  up  in  a  manner  to  be  a  convincing 
argument  for  those  who  consider  that  alcohol  is  a  detriment 
to  the  public  health.  It  is,  therefore,  necessary  for  us  to 
search  among  the  laboratory  evidences  and  the  special  studies, 
and  some  of  them  I  would  suggest  for  your  consideration 
and  use  in  your  educational  work. 

"Conradi  showed  that  there  was  a  diminished  production 
of  antibodies  in  cholera,  in  people  using  alcohol  freely,  after 
a  dose  of  protective  inoculation  had  been  given.  In  other 
words,  in  a  given  group  in  the  community,  you  can  accom- 
plish a  very  substantial  protection  against  cholera  by  pro- 
tective inoculation ;  but  if  the  people  in  the  presence  of  and 
following  the  protective  vaccination,  continue  the  use  of 
alcohol,  they  lose  the  benefit  of  antibody  production  which 
your  procedure  has  stimulated  or  should  stimulate  in  their 
bodies. 

"Pampoukis  and  Szeckley  found  unfavourable  results  and 
a  persistence  of  the  virus  of  rabies  in  subjects  under  anti- 
rabic  treatment  if  they  are  users  of  alcohol.  This  study  ex- 
tended over  twenty-five  years  of  administration  of  Pasteur 
treatment  at  Budapest. 

"Reich  noted  unmistakable  lowering  of  body  resistance  to 
disease,  indicated  by  a  less  effective  phagocytosis  in  typhoid 


208  Why  Prohibition! 

in  man  and  less  resistance  of  human  red  blood  cells  to  hypo- 
tonic  salt  solutions  in  proportion  to  the  use  of  alcohol.  These 
are  two  valuable  methods  of  measuring  cellular  resistance 
to  disease  and  response  to  infection. 

"In  addition  to  the  specific  lowering  of  resistance  to  in- 
fection and  lowered  ability  to  combat  infection  when  once 
acquired,  alcohol  plays  an  undoubted  contributing  part  in 
the  acquisition  and  spread  of  venereal  diseases. 

"Benedict  and  Doge  in  their  classical  monograph  on  the 
psychological  effects  of  alcohol,  reached  in  their  exact  studies 
of  the  time  reactions  of  various  reflexes  in  people  treated 
with  small  amounts  of  alcohol,  a  precise  foundation  for  the 
common  knowledge  that  alcohol  increases  liability  to  acci- 
dent. To  the  casual  observer  it  is  apparent  that  this  in- 
creased liability  to  accident  is  due  to  delayed  preception  of 
signs  occurring  in  the  immediate  vicinity  of  the  individual 
(which  would,  to  an  alert  and  sensitive  person,  indicate  a 
warning)  followed  by  delayed  response  and  decrease  in  the 
velocity  and  amplitude  of  the  necessary  muscular  move- 
ments which  must  be  carried  out  to  avoid  injury. 

"They  found  that  there  was  a  delay  of  10  per  cent,  in  the 
patellar  reflex  and  a  diminution  of  46  per  cent,  in  those 
dosed  with  small  amounts  of  alcohol.  Similarly  they  dis- 
covered a  10  per  cent,  diminution  in  the  lid  reflex,  5  per  cent, 
in  the  eye  reflex,  3  per  cent,  in  the  speech  reflex,  14  per  cent, 
diminution  to  faradic  stimulation,  9  per  cent,  diminution  in 
the  finger  movements  and  n  per  cent,  decrease  in  the  ve- 
locity of  the  eye  movements.  Just  note  what  that  series  of  ob- 
servations means.  Remember  that  an  accident  occurs  or  is 
missed  according  to  the  rapidity,  quality  and  amplitude  of 
the  neuro-muscular  response.  The  saw,  the  lathe,  the  swing- 


Liquor  and  the  Length  of  Life    209 

ing  beam  of  steel  does  or  does  not  mutilate  the  careless 
workmen,  according  to  the  reaction  of  a  thousandth  of  a  sec- 
ond upon  which  the  self -protective  mechanism  depends.  We 
used  to  say,  explaining  an  accident,  'The  man  was  dull  with 
his  beer';  now  we  know  the  measure  of  his  dullness,  that 
the  slight  dose  of  alcoholic  beverage  will,  with  certainty, 
delay  his  response  of  eye,  voice  and  hand,  and  he  suffers 
accordingly. 

"It  is  not  strange,  therefore,  that  careful  students  ob- 
serving large  numbers  of  dispensary  patients  reach  the  con- 
clusion which  Brickley  reached  at  the  Haymarket  Relief 
Station  in  Boston,  where  40,000  patients  a  year  pass  through 
the  hands  of  physicians  and  surgeons. 

"Brickley  summarises  the  results  of  his  studies  as  fol- 
lows: 

That  alcohol  causes  accidents. 

Obscures  the  diagnosis. 

Increases  the  danger  of  infection  at  the  time  of  accident. 

Prevents  adequate  treatment. 

Increases  the  danger  of  intercurrent  complications. 

Retards  the  process  of  repair. 

Gives  poorer  end  results. 

Increases  the  mortality  from  accidents. 

"We,  the  public  health  officers  of  this  country,  must  over- 
come the  inertia  of  this  habit  in  the  community  and  offset  the 
momentum  of  great  industries  by  teaching  the  consumer  and 
producer  of  alcoholic  beverages  to  discontinue  their  mutual 
conspiracy,  which  is  robbing  the  future  generations  of  their 
birthright  of  health. 

"What  are  you,  as  public  health  officers,  and  your  staff 
doing  now  by  personal  example  and  by  teaching  through 


210  Why  Prohibition! 

the  spoken  and  written  word  to  wean  your  community  from 
a  habit  which  is  a  large  contributory  factor  in  the  cause  of 
the  deaths  and  sicknesses  for  the  prevention  of  which  the 
community  employs  you  and  trusts  to  your  advice?  We 
must  teach  the  consumer  not  to  use  liquor,  and  I  believe  the 
public  is  learning  the  lesson.  I  think  that  there  is  no  power 
in  the  country  so  great  as  the  power  of  the  public  health 
officers  if  they  speak  and  write  to  this  effect  in  no  uncertain 
tones,  unanimously  and  continuously." 

As  Dr.  Emerson  suggests,  health  boards  have  a 
distinct  obligation  resting  upon  them  to  fight  the  use 
of  liquor. 

When  bad  tenements  kill  babies — and  you  can  kill 
babies  with  bad  tenements  as  well  as  with  axes — 
the  health  department  gets  after  the  owners,  and  the 
rotten  rookeries  are  cleaned  up  or  torn  down. 

When  unscrupulous  department  store  managers 
compel  women  to  work  in  foul  basements,  the  health 
department  insists  that  proper  ventilation  shall  be 
provided,  or  else  there's  trouble. 

When  boys  and  girls  are  crowded  into  shops  and 
factories  where  the  dust  is  thick  and  lungs  fill  up  with 
disease-breeding  germs,  the  health  department  exer- 
cises its  authority  and  demands  that  these  boys  and 
girls  shall  be  properly  safeguarded  by  such  contriv- 
ances as  will  expel  the  dust  and  germs. 

It  is  the  business  of  the  health  department  to  pro- 
tect the  health  and  the  lives  of  all  the  people.  Any- 
thing which  endangers  these  is  dealt  with  strenuously 
— when  the  health  officer  is  on  the  job. 


Liquor  and  the  Length  of  Life    211 

But  this  isn't  purely  a  "slum"  proposition — it  af- 
fects the  men  who  drink  in  clubs  and  cafes  on  the 
avenue,  as  well  as  those  who  spend  time  in  dens  and 
dives  in  the  alley. 

It  should  be  recognised  as  a  fundamental  pro- 
posal that  booze  is  bad  for  one's  health,  and  we 
should  go  after  it  just  as  we  would  tackle  sewer-gas 
and  foul  gutters  and  dust  germs  and  whatever  else 
makes  men  sick  and  causes  them  to  die. 

In  opening  the  convention  of  the  American  Med- 
ical Association  in  New  York  in  1917  Dr.  C.  H. 
Mayo,  of  Rochester,  Minn.,  the  famous  surgeon 
urged  national  prohibition: 

"No  one  except  the  policeman  sees  more  of  the  results  of 
overindulgence  in  alcohol,  demonstrated  by  pauperism,  sick- 
ness, immorality  and  crime,  than  the  physician.  Medicine 
has  reached  a  period  when  alcohol  is  rarely  employed  as  a 
drug,  being  displaced  by  better  remedies.  Alcohol's  only 
place  now  is  in  the  arts  and  sciences.  National  prohibition 
would  be  welcomed  by  the  medical  profession,"  he  said. 

The  New  York  Convention  of  the  American  Med- 
ical Association  just  referred  to — which  represents 
many  thousands  of  the  leading  physicians  in  this 
country — resolved  to  exclude  alcohol  from  the  phar- 
macopoeia— the  book  published  by  its  authority  con- 
taining the  formulas  and  methods  of  preparation  of 
medicines  for  the  use  of  druggists. 

This  action  by  prominent  medical  men  is  in  line 
with  an  increasing  conviction  among  physicians  that 


212  Why  Prohibition! 

alcohol  is  bad  for  the  human  race,  and  it  would  be 
an  easy  matter  to  multiply  such  testimony. 

There  is  no  point  to  the  bit  of  sarcasm  on  the 
part  of  the  liquor  men  that  if  we  would  abolish  the 
saloon  because  of  the  high  death-rate  of  those  en* 
gaged  in  the  liquor  business,  then,  by  the  same  token, 
we  must  abolish  the  railroad  business,  because  it  also 
has  a  high  death-rate  among  its  employes. 

In  the  first  place,  deaths  among  railroad  men  in 
the  past  have  often  been  due  to  the  influence  of  the 
liquor  business.  It  was  because  some  railroad  men 
patronised  saloons  that  accidents  occurred.  This 
was  so  true  that  to-day  most  railroads  will  not  per- 
mit their  employes  to  patronise  saloons  at  any  time, 
on  penalty  of  dismissal.  "Safety  First"  has  put  the 
saloon  out  of  business  in  many  railroad  centres. 

Sober  railroad  men  will  greatly  reduce  the  num- 
ber of  deaths  due  to  accidents.  Now  the  railroad 
men  themselves  are  fighting  the  saloon,  because  they 
know  that  not  only  is  the  life  of  the  man  who  drinks 
imperiled,  but  he  also  endangers  all  those  who  work 
with  him. 

Furthermore,  even  though  the  death-rate  of  the 
men  in  the  railroad  business  is  above  the  normal,  it 
should  be  remembered  that  the  railroad  business  is 
a  productive  business,  that  it  serves  a  good  purpose 
and  that  it  has  a  permanent  value.  There  are  few 
business  enterprises  which  have  served  and  still  serve 
the  people  more  efficiently  than  the  railroad  compa- 
nies in  this  country. 


Liquor  and  the  Length  of  Life    213 

This  cannot  be  said  for  the  liquor  business.  Its 
tendency  is  to  do  harm  instead  of  good;  it  does  not 
serve  the  people  except  to  ruin  them.  The  liquor 
business  not  only  injures  those  who  are  engaged  in 
it,  but  it  destroys  those  who  use  its  products.  There 
is  almost  no  escape  for  those  who  patronise  it. 

On  the  other  hand,  while  there  is  a  heavy  death- 
rate  among  the  employes  of  railroad  cpmpanies, 
the  number  of  passengers  killed  is  comparatively 
small — only  an  average  of  about  300  per  year,  or 
about  one  passenger  out  of  every  3,000,000  car- 
ried. 

It  is  true  that  railroad  companies  kill  many  more 
people — trespassers,  and  many  who  were  not  tres- 
passers, besides  men  in  their  own  employ — but  we 
are  considering  the  question  of  the  relative  number 
of  those  who  are  killed  because  they  patronised 
either  saloons  or  railroads. 

Alcohol  is  used  for  making  gunpowder;  therefore, 
say  the  booze  advocates,  Prohibition  is  unpatriotic, 
because  without  gunpowder  we  could  not  defend  our 
country  against  an  alien  enemy. 

It  is  granted  by  the  liquor  enthusiasts  that  Pro- 
hibition laws  may  be  so  framed  as  to  provide  alcohol 
for  scientific,  mechanical  and  non-beverage  purposes, 
but  it  is  insisted  that  during  normal  times — that  is, 
when  no  war  is  on — alcohol  plants  could  not  exist 
commercially  for  the  purposes  of  supplying  these 
uses  alone. 

Hence,  the  booze  makers  want  the  privilege  of 


214  Why  Prohibition! 

running  their  distilleries  at  full  blast  during  times  of 
peace — as  a  result  of  which  many  hundreds  of  thou- 
sands of  lives  may  be  destroyed — in  order  that  they 
may  be  ready  to  run  their  distilleries  during  times  of 
war,  when  other  hundreds  of  thousands  of  lives  may 
be  destroyed. 

What  a  destructive  thing  the  booze  business  is, 
anyway ! 

Interesting,  isn't  it,  that  the  liquor  men  demand 
the  right  to  kill  more  men  illegally  during  peace 
times  than  would  be  killed  during  war  times — just 
so  that  the  booze  business  may  be  saved — no  mat- 
ter what  havoc  it  may  create  throughout  the  world ! 


Why  the  Saloon  Must  Go 

CLARENCE  DARROW — the  "labour-lawyer"  who 
defended  the  McNamara  brothers,  the  California 
dynamiters,  a  few  years  ago — threw  a  bluff  into  a 
labour  meeting  the  other  day,  where  he  spoke  under 
the  auspices  of  a  local  bartenders'  union  against  the 
prohibition  movement. 

"Has  drink  ever  done  you  any  harm?"  he  asked 
his  audience,  and  he  waited  a  moment  for  a  re- 
ply. 

"It  killed  my  brother!"  volunteered  a  voice  in  the 
pit. 

"It  killed  my  brother,  too!"  said  another  man  a 
little  further  back. 

Darrow  was  flabbergasted!  He  didn't  know  the 
real  sentiments  of  his  audience.  He  probably  sup- 
posed that  he  was  talking  to  a  bartenders'  crowd. 

"Has  drink  ever  done  you  any  harm  ?"  The  work- 
ingmen  of  America  are  coming  to  believe  that  it  has. 
It  isn't  safe  to  recklessly  throw  into  a  crowd  of 
workingmen  a  challenge  which  may  so  easily  be  an- 
swered! For  they  are  coming  to  know  the  facts. 

215 


216  Why  Prohibition! 

And  the  facts  are  always  against  the  liquor  busi- 
ness. 

It  is  bad  enough  for  booze  to  kill  the  body  of  your 
brother — it  is  a  worse  thing  for  booze  to  kill  his 
soul. 

But  what  about  the  man  who  carries  a  dead  soul 
in  a  living  body?  This  is  what  happens  to  many  a 
man  who  has  become  booze-soaked. 

For  drink  destroys  a  man's  soul  before  it  kills 
his  body — and  usually  he  doesn't  know  what's  hap- 
pening to  him.  That's  the  sad  part  of  it. 

We  are  realising  more  and  more  that  soul-culture 
and  the  things  that  grow  out  of  the  use  of  booze 
cannot  occupy  the  same  body  at  the  same  time — in 
the  end  one  will  drive  the  other  out — and  usually 
booze  comes  out  ahead  in  the  struggle. 

The  attack  upon  the  liquor  traffic  cannot  be  side- 
tracked because  the  liquor  men  declare  that  exces- 
sive eating  is  as  harmful  as  excessive  drinking. 

We'll  readily  admit  that  "temperance"  must  in- 
clude moderation  in  the  eating  of  food  as  in  every- 
thing else.  In  some  things,  however,  the  practice 
of  "temperance"  isn't  enough — there  are  certain  cus- 
toms or  tendencies  which  demand  Prohibition  or  total 
abstinence. 

A  "temperate"  murderer,  for  example — one  who 
kills  others  only  "moderately" — isn't  to  be  tolerated 
under  any  circumstances. 

If  it  can  be  demonstrated  that  the  use  of  alcohol, 
even  in  moderation,  is  injurious  to  the  human  mind 


Why  the  Saloon  Must  Go       217 

and  body,  then  it  becomes  a  question  as  to  whether 
even  its  temperate  use  is  to  be  permitted. 

As  to  the  relative  harmfulness  of  excessive  eating 
or  drinking,  it  will  be  admitted  that  the  man  who 
drinks  to  excess  is  more  harmful  to  society  than  he 
who  eats  to  excess. 

For  while  both  may  be  injuring  their  bodies  on 
account  of  their  intemperate  habits,  the  man  who 
drinks  to  excess  also  almost  invariably  becomes  a 
charge  upon  the  State,  or  at  least  he  is  liable  to  do 
harm  to  others  on  account  of  his  drinking  habits. 

George  Washington  owned  a  wine  cellar — we  are 
told  by  some  ardent  saloon  defenders.  Others  go  so 
far  as  to  say  that  he  was  also  an  inn-keeper. 

Therefore,  they  assume,  it's  all  right  in  this  day 
and  generation  for  a  man  to  own  a  wine-cellar  and 
run  a  saloon. 

But  George  Washington  was  also  a  slave-owner. 
Whether  he  was  a  kind  slave-owner  or  a  brutal  slave- 
owner, doesn't  make  any  difference.  We  are  sure 
that  he  owned  slaves. 

Shall  we  also  assume  that  it's  all  right  for  men 
in  this  day  and  generation  to  own  slaves  ? 

Suppose  President  Woodrow  Wilson  owned  a 
slave-pen  because  his  illustrious  predecessor,  George 
Washington,  owned  one? 

It  doesn't  require  a  great  stretch  of  the  imagina- 
tion to  picture  what  would  happen  to  him,  even 
though  he  is  President  of  the  United  States. 


218  Why  Prohibition! 

Standards  change.  What  may  have  been  accepted 
one  hundred  years  ago  is  now  outlawed. 

Our  ideals  advance.  What  may  have  been  con- 
sidered moral  and  right  long  ago  is  now  scorned 
as  the  ethics  of  the  jungle. 

The  saloon  business  to-day  is  a  discredited  busi- 
ness, no  matter  whether  George  Washington  owned 
a  wine-cellar  or  not. 

That's  why  no  man  who  cares  anything  about 
his  standing  or  the  standing  of  his  wife  and  children 
goes  into  the  liquor  business. 

You  can't  charge  it  up  to  George  Washington, 
either,  for  he  did  the  best  he  knew  in  his  day  and 
generation. 

And  the  world  expects  every  man  to  do  his  level 
best  to-day. 

When  a  man  sees  clearly,  and  feels  and  knows 
that  he's  doing  wrong,  he  can't  expect  to  get  any 
mercy  because  some  other  man  in  a  darker  age  was 
guilty  of  the  same  sin. 

The  liquor  men  wish  to  usave  the  boy,"  but  here's 
how  they  want  to  "save"  him — according  to  the 
"Anti-Prohibition  Manual  of  the  Wholesale  Liquor 
Dealers'  Association." 

They  propose  to  subject  him  to  all  the  temptations 
of  the  saloon,  and  if  he  doesn't  fall,  he's  saved;  if 
he  does  fall,  then  "it's  his  fault  and  the  fault  of  his 
parents." 

But  the  real  point  of  their  argument  is  that  a  boy 
is  no  good,  anyway,  unless  he's  been  up  against  all 


Why  the  Saloon  Must  Go       219 

that  the  use  of  beer  and  whiskey  subjects  him  to, 
and  he  has  definitely  proven  that  he  cannot  be  over- 
come by  their  influence. 

To  be  sure,  the  force  of  their  own  logic  compels 
them  to  admit  that  there's  very  grave  danger  of  the 
boy's  falling  through  the  use  of  strong  drink.  But 
what  of  that?  The  only  way  to  "save  the  boy"  is 
to  give  him  a  chance  to  go  wrong ! 

If  there's  evil  in  strong  drink,  the  logical  thing  to 
do  is  to  leave  it  alone — isn't  it?  That's  the  way  we 
regard  every  other  evil. 

If  the  good  in  the  use  of  liquor  were  so  great  as 
to  make  it  of  supreme  value — if  it  brought  advan- 
tages which  could  not  be  secured  in  any  other  way — 
then  there  might  be  some  justification  in  putting  a 
boy  into  a  position  where  he'd  have  at  least  a  fight- 
ing chance. 

But  everybody  knows  that  there  are  some  boys, 
who,  subjected  to  the  temptations  of  the  taste  of 
liquor,  are  almost  certain  to  be  overcome — and  to 
subject  the  stronger  boys  to  the  test  isn't  worth  the 
game. 

"The  saloon  is  a  blessing  instead  of  a  curse," 
vociferates  the  exponent  of  booze.  Is  it?  Let's 
see.  When  an  institution  or  a  business  is  a  blessing 
to  society  every  fair  method  is  adopted  to  push  it 
along. 

That's  what  we  do  with  schools  and  colleges, 
churches  and  hospitals,  art  galleries  and  museums, 
chambers  of  commerce  and  business  men's  clubs,  and 


220  Why  Prohibition! 

a  score  or  more  of  other  organisations  whose  value 
the  people  as  a  whole  readily  acknowledge,  and 
whose  prosperity  and  success  are  rejoiced  in. 

But  what  about  the  saloon? 

In  most  enlightened  communities,  no  saloon  is 
permitted  within  a  given  distance  of  a  church.  If 
the  saloon  is  a  beneficent  enterprise,  why  not  tie  up 
the  church  and  the  saloon  so  that  they  may  together 
work  out  the  spiritual  and  ethical  problems  of  the 
people  ? 

No  saloon  is  permitted  within  a  certain  distance 
of  a  public  school. 

If  the  saloon's  influence  is  good  for  children,  why 
not  have  the  teachers  in  the  public  school  use  it 
as  an  object  lesson  to  demonstrate  the  social  and 
educational  value  of  the  liquor  business? 

If  the  saloon  is  a  wholesome  business,  and  its 
influence  is  uplifting  in  municipal  affairs,  why  does 
the  State  declare,  in  many  parts  of  our  country,  that 
the  saloon  shall  be  closed  on  election  day? 

If  the  saloon  is  a  blessing  to  mankind,  why  are  the 
number  of  saloons  usually  limited? 

And  why  are  they  restricted  to  certain  areas  in 
the  average  city?  If  they  are  good  for  the  people^ 
why  not  welcome  them  as  to  numbers  and  as  to  tha 
locality  in  which  they  may  exercise  their  benign  in* 
fluence? 

Not  even  the  poor  who  live  in  wretched  tenements 
should  have  a  monopoly  of  such  true  blessedness 


Why  the  Saloon  Must  Go      221 

as  the  saloon  always  brings  with  it — if  it  is  good  for 
all  men. 

if  If  the  proceedings  within  the  saloon  are  of  such 
an  inspiring  character,  why  not  permit  them  to  do 
business  without  restraint  in  the  neighbourhoods 
where  they  are  permitted  to  exist?  Why  limit  the 
number  of  hours  in  which  they  may  sell  booze,  and 
why  have  the  curtains  drawn,  and  why  have  panels 
to  obstruct  the  view  of  those  who  are  outside  !, 

Why  does  the  State  persist  in  taxing  the  saloon 
and  the  liquor  business,  penalising  it  at  every  op- 
portunity? If  it  is  such  a  beneficent  business  why 
doesn't  the  State  subsidise  it,  as  it  has  done  with 
some  other  industries;  or,  why  doesn't  the  State  en- 
dow it,  as  it  has  its  schools  and  colleges?  Why 
doesn't  it  relieve  the  liquor  business  from  the  neces- 
sity of  paying  taxes  upon  its  property,  as  is  the  case 
with  the  churches? 

Why?  Well — any  half-grown  boy  or  girl  can  tell 
you  why.  It  doesn't  require  an  opinion  from  the 
court,  nor  the  verdict  of  an  expert  sociologist.  Mil- 
lions of  wives  and  mothers  can  tell  you  why.  And 
the  liquor  men  themselves  know  why. 

This  business  of  fighting  the  saloon  isn't  a  propa- 
ganda which  owes  its  origin  to  a  few  fanatics — it  is 
the  result  of  an  uprising  among  the  people  in  pro- 
test against  the  evils  of  the  saloon. 

It  isn't  to  be  accounted  for  by  charging  it  up  to 
"meddlers"  or  "busybodies,"  neither  is  the  fight  on 


222  Why  Prohibition! 

the  saloon  due  to  a  desire  to  force  upon  an  unwilling 
nation  "sumptuary  legislation." 

The  desire  to  wipe  out  the  saloon  is  due  to  the 
natural  instinct  of  men  to  preserve  the  race. 

When  there's  a  prairie  fire  the  entire  country-side 
turns  out  to  extinguish  it.  When  there's  an  epidemic 
of  any  kind,  the  State  and  the  nation  will  go  to  any 
expense  in  order  to  halt  its  ravages.  When  a  flood 
sweeps  through  the  lowlands,  it's  a  matter  which  con- 
cerns everybody. 

It's  precisely  so  with  the  saloon.  When  it  is  shown 
that  the  saloon  destroys  life,  wrecks  manhood  and 
womanhood  and  degrades  childhood,  we  don't  stop 
to  parley  about  giving  the  saloon  "a  square  deal"; 
we  put  it  out  of  business. 

We  don't  discuss  the  question  of  compensation — 
one  might  as  well  talk  about  compensation  and  "a 
square  deal"  in  connection  with  smallpox  or  tuber- 
culosis. 

No — the  existence  of  the  saloon  is  a  call  to  strong 
men  for  service  just  as  though  a  foe  were  to  invade 
our  native  land.  We  fight  for  the  race  in  response 
to  that  instinct  which  is  born  in  the  hearts  of  all 
true  men  and  women,  and  it  is  this  instinct  which 
makes  us  fight  the  saloon. 

The  chief  reason  why  fighting  the  saloon  is  dif- 
ferent from  fighting  most  other  social  evils  is  the 
fact  that  the  saloon  business  has  hit  most  of  us  in  a 
very  vital  spot. 

The  liquor  men  complain  that  those  that  oppose 


Why  the  Saloon  Must  Go       223 

the  saloon  are  "unreasonable" — that  they  do  not 
look  at  all  the  facts  in  the  case,  social  and  economic. 

This  may  be  true,  with  regard  to  a  considerable 
number  of  saloon  opponents.  They  have  never 
stopped  to  reason  out  how  many  men  will  lose  their 
jobs,  or  how  much  the  government  will  lose,  or 
whether  the  farmer  will  be  unable  to  dispose  of  his 
produce,  when  the  liquor  people  no  longer  purchase 
it.  All  this  means  very  little  to  them.  There  is  just 
one  consuming  reason  as  to  why  they  fight  the  saloon 
— the  saloon  has  taken  their  boy. 

Now,  the  liquor  men  may  argue  until  they  are 
black  in  the  face,  and  the  philosophers  may  phil- 
osophise until  they  have  exhausted  their  fine  spun 
theories,  and  the  scientific  "doctors"  may  quote  from 
other  authorities  who  believe  in  booze  until  the  crack 
of  doom — but  the  whole  aggregation  will  never  suc- 
ceed in  persuading  that  heart-broken  father  and  soul- 
wrung  mother  that  a  booze  joint  is  a  "good  thing." 

For  how  can  a  "good"  saloon  cause  the  wreckage 
of  the  son  in  whom  they  had  placed  all  their  hopes? 
And  if  it  caused  the  downfall  of  their  boy,  why 
won't  it  cause  the  downfall  of  some  other  boy? 

"Hysterical,"  all  this?  Sentimental?  Fanatical? 
Call  it  what  you  please.  It's  what's  back  of  most 
of  the  opposition  to  the  saloon.  And  all  the  cold- 
blooded ridicule  of  the  saloon  crowd  can't  take  it  out 
of  the  fight. 

Economic  arguments  are  needed.  Scientific  truth 
is  good.  But  the  biggest  factor  in  wiping  out  the  sa- 


224  Why  Prohibition! 

loon  will  be  the  thoroughly  human  sentiment  that  the 
saloon  wrecks  men  and  women. 

"It  isn't  the  saloon  that  makes  a  man  miserable — • 
it's  his  poverty,"  says  the  exponent  of  the  saloon. 
But  you  never  heard  of  a  saloon  relieving  a  man  of 
his  poverty.  Every  time  he  comes  out  of  a  saloon, 
he's  a  lot  poorer  than  when  he  went  in.  He's  poorer 
every  way. 

He's  poorer  financially.  There  never  was  a  saloon 
that  made  a  customer  richer  in  cash. 

He's  poorer  in  self-respect.  The  longer  he  re- 
main in  the  saloon  the  less  respect  he  carries  away 
with  him.  He  loses  his  self-respect,  and  his  friends 
often  lose  their  respect  for  him. 

He's  poorer  economically.  As  a  workman,  he  be- 
comes less  efficient.  Never  yet  has  the  saloon  made 
a  workingman  richer  in  the  ability  to  do  things. 

He's  poorer  physically.  The  saloon  never  im- 
proved a  man's  health.  The  man  who  patronises  the 
saloon  becomes  more  susceptible  to  disease — he  is 
less  able  to  resist  disease.  He  cannot  stand  the 
strains  of  life  so  well. 

He's  poorer  mentally.  His  brain  is  befuddled. 
He  doesn't  think  straight.  The  more  time  he  spends 
in  the  saloon,  the  less  others  will  be  inclined  to  tr  ist 
his  judgment.  He  not  only  loses  confidence  in  him- 
self, but  those  with  whom  he  does  business  lose  con- 
fidence in  him. 

He's  poorer  socially.  His  value  as  a  contributor 
to  the  common  good  of  his  fellowmen  is  lessened. 


Why  the  Saloon  Must  Go       225 

Those  who  are  interested  in  securing  better  condi- 
tions for  workingmen  cannot  afford  to  become  the 
victims  of  the  drink  habit. 

If  it's  poverty  that  makes  a  man  miserable,  then 
he  had  better  keep  away  from  the  saloon — for  the 
saloon  never  made  a  man  richer  in  the  slightest  de- 
gree in  any  particular. 

There  is  no  group  of  men  which  knows  more 
about  the  effects  and  influence  of  the  liquor  business 
than  the  inmates  of  penitentiaries.  It  is  not  sur- 
prising, therefore,  that  these  men  should  advocate 
the  abolition  of  the  saloon. 

Such  an  expression  on  the  part  of  certain  groups 
of  convicts  has  brought  forth  from  the  liquor  men's 
journals  bits  of  sarcasm  and  ridicule  which  are  shot 
at  both  the  convicts  in  question  and  at  anti-saloon 
men  with  whom,  it  is  being  said,  these  "jail-birds" 
have  lined  up. 

Of  course,  no  argument  is  produced  to  demon- 
strate that  the  " jail-birds"  are  wrong. — they  are  sim- 
ply jeered  at  because  they  have  taken  sides  with 
saloon  fighters. 

If  these  same  men  had  declared  themselves  in 
favour  of  the  saloon, — if  they  had  voted  in  favour  of 
red-light  districts  and  gambling  houses — the  liquor 
men's  journals  would  never  have  said  a  word  against 
them. 

But  when  men  who  must  know  why  they  are  sent 
to  jail,  and  what  led  them  into  the  wrong  life,  frankly 
state  that  they  are  ready  to  do  away  with  that  which. 


226  Why  Prohibition! 

cursed  them,  then  the  liquor  men's  journals  scorn 
them  and  make  light  of  their  resolutions. 

It  should  be  remembered  that  the  average  man 
in  jail  to-day  is  very  much  like  most  other  men.  It 
it  being  demonstrated  that  there  is  no  "criminal 
class."  Those  who  are  in  jail  are  usually  there  be- 
cause of  unusual  temptation,  and  the  saloon  is  a  chief 
factor  in  making  sin  and  vice  attractive. 

Nobody  knows  this  quite  so  well  as  those  who 
have  had  their  own  experiences  in  saloons.  They 
know  what  they  are  talking  about.  And  when  men 
of  this  type  tell  us  that  the  saloon  business  is  a  bad 
business,  the  rest  of  us  can  afford  to  listen. 

Everybody  knows  that  the  saloon  is  the  breeding 
place  of  vice  and  crime ;  that  it  harbours  and  encour- 
ages the  white  slave  traffic ;  shelters  crooks  and  gam- 
blers; is  the  birth-place  of  rotten  politics;  causes  dis- 
ease and  death;  is  the  enemy  of  peace  and  order; 
causes  the  most  degrading  poverty;  wrecks  more 
homes  than  any  other  institution;  fills  jails,  alms- 
houses,  and  insane  asylums;  and  sends  men  to  the 
scaffold  and  the  electric  chair. 

To  quote  from  Robert  G.  Ingersoll : 

"It  brings  shame,  not  honour;  terror,  not  safety;  despair, 
not  hope;  misery,  not  happiness;  and  with  the  malevolence 
of  a  fiend  it  calmly  surveys  its  frightful  desolation,  and 
unsatisfied  with  havoc,  it  poisons  felicity,  kills  peace,  ruins 
morals,  blights  confidence,  slays  reputation  and  wipes  out 
national  honour ;  then  curses  the  world  and  laughs  at  its  ruin. 


Why  the  Saloon  Must  Go       227 

It  does  all  that  and  more.  It  murders  the  soul.  It  is  the 
sum  of  all  villanies,  the  father  of  all  crime,  the  mother  of 
all  abominations,  the  devil's  best  friend  and  man's  worst 
enemy." 

And  from  Martin  Luther: 

"Whoever  first  brewed  beer  has  prepared  a  pest  for  Ger- 
many. I  have  prayed  to  God  that  he  would  destroy  the 
whole  brewing  industry.  I  have  often  pronounced  a  curse 
on  the  brewer.  All  Germany  could  live  on  the  barley  that 
is  spoiled  and  turned  into  a  curse  by  the  brewer." 

And  Theodore  Roosevelt: 

"The  friends  of  the  saloonkeepers  denounce  their  oppo- 
nents for  not  treating  the  saloon  business  like  any  other. 
The  best  answer  to  this  is  that  the  business  is  not  like  any 
other  business  and  that  the  actions  of  the  saloonkeepers  them- 
selves conclusively  prove  this  to  be  the  case.  The  business 
tends  to  produce  criminality  in  the  population  at  large  and 
law  breaking  among  the  saloonkeepers  themselves.  When 
the  liquor  men  are  allowed  to  do  as  they  wish,  they  are  sure 
to  debauch,  not  only  the  body  social,  but  the  body  politic 
also." 

And  here's  some  live  testimony — right  up  to  date 
— from  the  liquor  men  themselves.  "Bonfort's 
Wine  and  Spirit  Circular"  of  New  York  is  one  of 
the  best-known  liquor  journals  of  the  country.  Here 
is  its  evidence : 

"The  modern  saloon  has  been  getting  worse  instead  of 


228  Why  Prohibition! 

better.  It  has  been  dragged  in  the  gutter ;  it  has  been  made 
the  cat's  paw  for  other  forms  of  vice;  it  has  succumbed  to 
the  viciousness  of  gambling  and  it  has  allowed  itself  to  be- 
come allied  with  the  social  evil." 

P.  H.  Nolan  of  New  York,  chairman  of  a  com- 
mittee of  the  National  Liquor  Dealers'  Association, 
had  this  to  say  about  the  brewers  in  an  address  de- 
livered in  Kansas  City: 

"The  average  brewer  in  a  mad  desire  for  wealth  is  care- 
less of  public  sentiment.  He  has  no  respect  for  law,  regula- 
tion, or  public  decency.  He  buys  a  church  window  for  $100 
and  then  assumes  a  sanctimonious  attitude.  His  business 
is  to  corrupt  public  officials  that  he  may  thrive.  The  brewers 
of  the  United  States  are  a  menace  to  society." 

And  here's  some  more  testimony : 

"The  rat,  the  vampire,  the  knocker — living  on  the 
life-blood  of  an  industry  threatened  with  destruc- 
tion, which  they  are  doing  little  or  nothing  to  pro- 
tect"— this  is  the  characterisation  by  the  editor  of 
the  Liberal  Advocate  of  the  liquor  dealers  who  failed 
to  attend  a  liquor  dealers'  convention. 

There  must  be  a  good  many  of  these  species  among 
saloonkeepers — if  what  the  editor  says  is  true — be- 
cause the  attendance  at  these  "important"  meetings 
is  comparatively  small. 

It  is  rather  rough  on  the  saloonkeepers — to  be 
called  such  gentle  names  by  their  own  friends!  It 


Why  the  Saloon  Must  Go      229 

isn't  very  often  that  even  an  anti-saloon  "agitator" 
uses  such  epithets  in  describing  a  saloonkeeper. 

Possibly  the  editor  of  the  Liberal  Advocate  knows 
more  about  saloonkeepers  than  the  anti-saloon  men 
do !  And,  of  course,  he  has  a  perfect  right  to  "show 
up"  the  men  who  are  in  the  saloon  business. 

We'll  probably  have  to  accept  the  characterisation 
— since  it  comes  from  so  high  an  authority. 

And  so  we  can  understand  why  "pure  beer  and 
clean  business"  is  now  to  be  the  slogan  of  a  famous 
brewing  concern  with  reference  to  the  management 
of  saloons.  An  attempt  is  to  be  made  to  have  all 
breweries  join  in  this  movement  for  the  purification 
of  the  saloon  business.  But  there  are  difficulties  in 
the  way,  the  brewery  men  declare. 

They  are  right.  They  are  more  nearly  right  than 
they  know.  Not  only  will  there  be  difficulties  in  the 
way  so  far  as  other  brewers  are  concerned,  but  in  a 
movement  of  this  kind  one  must  consider  the  thou- 
sands of  saloonkeepers  whose  chief  profit  comes  to 
them  because  of  the  disreputable  character  of  their 
business.  These  are  not  likely  to  join  the  brewers 
in  their  crusade  against  unclean  saloons. 

Undoubtedly  there  are  many  saloonkeepers  who 
would  rather  run  decent  saloons  than  indecent  ones. 
But  the  matter  is  beyond  their  control.  They  cannot 
choose  their  patrons.  If  they  tried  to  do  so,  they 
would  soon  have  no  business  at  all. 

There  are  certain  glaring  evils  which  may  be 
minimised  by  heroic  efforts  but  the  worst  features 


230  Why  Prohibition! 

of  the  American  saloon  are  not  those  which  hit  one 
in  the  face  and  which  are  only  too  obvious — the 
worst  features  of  the  saloon  are  the  insidious,  ser- 
pentine influences  which  cannot  be  readily  "scotched" 
and  destroyed. 

The  saloon  is  notoriously  on  the  side  of  crooked 
government  and  grafting,  bribing  politicians. 

The  influence  of  the  saloon  upon  social  life  is  bad 
— it's  always  bad,  when  one  counts  up  all  the  items, 
no  matter  how  much  the  saloon  may  serve  in  some 
minor  details. 

It's  the  very  nature  of  the  saloon  to  cast  a  shadow 
over  society.  How  can  the  brewers,  however  good 
their  intentions  may  be,  meet  this  situation? 

Plainly,  they  do  not  intend  to.  They  know  that 
they  could  not  if  they  would. 

It  is  quite  natural,  therefore,  that  at  successive 
conventions  of  various  kinds  of  liquor  dealers'  as- 
sociations resolutions  should  be  passed  deploring  the 
tendency  of  the  saloon  to  become  the  centre  of  so 
many  bad  social  and  political  influences,  and  that  it 
is  "resolved"  to  clean  up  the  saloon  business,  be- 
cause, these  wise  men  argue,  if  they  don't  clean  up 
their  business,  the  public  will  clean  out  the  entire 
liquor  business. 

But  here's  a  peculiar  thing  about  the  entire  situa- 
tion— while  the  liquor  men  themselves  frankly  admit 
the  evils  which  exist  in  the  saloon,  there  are  large 
numbers  of  perfectly  respectable  people  who  are 


Why  the  Saloon  Must  Go      231 

fighting  the  battles  of  the  saloon  and  systematically 
voting  for  its  retention. 

It  is  unthinkable  that  there  should  be  any  com- 
promise in  the  fight  on  the  booze  business. 

They  tell  us  that  we  aren't  fair  in  our  attack. 
They  say  that  we  hit  "below  the  belt." 

Now,  that's  what  every  fellow  who  is  being  beaten 
always  says.  He  always  cries  "foul." 

But  how  can  one  be  "fair"  to  the  liquor  business? 
You  can't  be  "fair"  to  booze  any  more  than  you  can 
be  "fair"  to  the  smallpox  or  any  other  disease  that  is 
ravaging  the  people. 

No — the  liquor  business  is  a  bad  business,  and  be- 
cause it's  a  bad  business  it  must  go !  It  may  seem 
unkind  to  some  of  those  who  in  various  ways  are 
identified  with  it,  but  our  chief  concern  must  be  for 
the  great  mass  of  people  to  whom  the  liquor  men 
have  themselves  been  brutally  unkind,  and  who  have 
been  made  to  suffer  incalculable  injury,  the  extent  of 
which  cannot  be  measured  in  the  terms  of  dollars. 

There  can  be  no  compromise.  There  will  be  none. 
There's  just  one  thing,  and  only  one,  that  will  cause 
anti-saloon  fighting  to  cease — the  complete  extinction 
of  the  saloon. 

But — "If  you  close  the  saloon,  and  make  it  dif- 
ficult for  men  to  get  strong  drink,  they  will  be  driven 
to  the  use  of  drugs,"  we  are  told  by  the  defenders 
of  the  saloon.  It  has  been  amply  demonstrated  that 
ordinarily  those  who  use  drugs  also  drink 

BUT  THEY  DRANK  FIRST! 


232  Why  Prohibition! 

Shall  we  continue  to  encourage  the  use  of  strong 
drink,  and  thus  increase  the  number  of  people  who 
would  inevitably  be  driven  to  the  use  of  drugs? 

Or  shall  we  close  the  saloon,  which  is  primarily 
responsible  for  the  use  of  both  drugs  and  liquor? 

Men  are  drinking  the  vilest  kind  of  stuff  in  Russia 
and  elsewhere  because  they  cannot  get  regular  vodka 
or  booze — so  we  are  told. 

Suppose  it  is  true.  What  makes  them  do  it?  It's 
the  booze  and  the  vodka  that  they  drank  before  they 
began  to  poison  themselves  with  vile  substitutes. 

The  argument  as  to  conditions  in  Russia  is  the 
same  as  has  been  put  up  to  us  with  reference  to  the 
use  of  drugs  in  this  country. 

If  booze  has  this  effect  upon  a  man — if  it  so  en- 
slaves him  that  it  drives  him  to  practices  which  are 
almost  certain  to  kill  him — then  how  in  the  name  of 
common  sense  can  anybody  use  this  fact  as  an  argu- 
ment in  favour  of  using  more  booze  so  that  a  still 
larger  number  of  people  may  be  thus  enslaved. 

The  bad  sanitary  conditions  in  saloons  are  a  strong 
argument  against  them. 

"Call  him  a  bartender.  Look  at  that  song-and- 
dance  shirt;  that  collar  he's  wearing.  He  put  it  on 
Monday  and  to-day's  Thursday.  Look  at  his  hands 
— enough  muck  under  his  finger  nails  to  plant  a  gar- 
den; see  those  cuspidors. — filled  with  garbage.  They 
haven't  been  cleaned  in  a  month.  Look  at  the  mirror 
— can  you  see  your  reflection  through  the  fly  specks? 


Why  the  Saloon  Must  Go       233 

Wonder  the  air  doesn't  poison  the  patrons  of  the 
place !" 

Pretty  good  description  of  some  bartenders  and 
some  saloons,  isn't  it?  But  who  wrote  it?  A  fas- 
tidious W.  C.  T.  U.  investigator?  Or  an  anti-saloon 
agitator?  Or  a  "Prohibition  crank?" 

Not  at  all.  It  was  written  by  the  general  secretary 
of  the  Bartenders'  International  League  of  America, 
quoting  the  local  representative  of  the  union  and  he 
should  be  a  pretty  good  authority  on  such  matters. 
Of  course,  it  was  a  non-union  saloon  and  a  non- 
union bartender  he  was  describing. 

Here's  some  more  of  it: 

"The  porter  is  back  there  playing  cards.  He  is  so 
lazy  he  sleeps  with  his  clothes  on — don't  they  look 
it?  The  porter  and  bartender  take  turns  in  visiting 
the  barber  shop  once  a  month— they  have  cleanliness 
on  the  Ve-don't  patronise'  list ;  and  you  wonder  why 
we  refuse  to  solicit  such  cattle  to  become  members  of 
our  grand  little  union?  Let's  get  out  of  this  before 
we  get  cholera  or  something  equally  serious.  We'll 
walk  down  the  street,  and  I  can  show  you  several 
more  such  places  with  fellows  who  disgrace  the  name 
of  bartender." 

And  remember  that  this  description  is  given  to 
us  by  an  "expert."  The  secretary  was  being  escorted 
about  town  by  the  business  agent  of  the  local  bar- 
tenders' union,  who  apparently  was  charged  with 
making  too  slow  progress  because  he  was  too  par- 
ticular as  to  whom  he  invited  into  his  union,  and 


234  Why  Prohibition! 

the  secretary  was  apparently  trying  to  justify  his 
position. 

But  you  may  draw  your  own  conclusions  from  this 
little  episode.  It  certainly  proves  that  there  are  a 
very  considerable  number  of  saloons  which  even  the 
most  low-down  citizens  should  be  afraid  and  ashamed 
to  patronise. 

Railroad  companies  have  abolished  the  common 
drinking  glass.  Each  passenger  is  entitled  to  an  in- 
dividual paper  cup  on  up-to-date  railroads. 

The  common  towel  has  long  since  disappeared 
from  even  the  smaller  hotels. 

The  churches  are  discarding  the  common  cup 
used  for  the  communion  service,  small  individual 
glasses  being  employed. 

In  the  cases  mentioned,  the  average  person  using 
glass  and  towel  and  cup  is  at  least  a  fairly  decent  in- 
dividual, having  regard  for  his  neighbour,  and  try- 
ing to  observe  the  rules  of  cleanliness. 

But  what  about  the  saloon  with  respect  to  sanitary 
conditions  ? 

With  the  exception  of  those  who  conduct  the  com- 
paratively few  "cafes"  for  the  benefit  of  the  profes- 
sional, merchant,  upper  clerk  class,  and  others  in 
this  group,  the  average  saloonkeeper  douses  the  used 
glass  in  a  puddle  of  water,  which,  in  a  short  time, 
becomes  a  pool  for  microbes,  thick  with  germs  and 
thus  full  of  peril  to  every  patron  of  the  saloon. 

Men  with  tuberculosis  and  all  kinds  of  malignant 
diseases  patronise  these  saloons.  No  matter  how 


Why  the  Saloon  Must  Go      235 

vile  the  afflictions,  the  average  bartender  will  sell 
such  men  drinks,  endangering  the  health  of  all  his 
customers. 

No  man  would  consciously  subject  himself  to  the 
dangers  which  lurk  in  the  saloonkeeper's  water 
trough.  The  average  man  simply  does  not  stop  to 
think  of  this  peril  when  he  patronises  a  saloon. 

And  so,  what  liquor  itself  may  fail  to  do  to  some 
men,  the  disease-breeding  glass,  fresh  from  an  im- 
mersion in  the  germ-laden  "cleansing"  water,  does 
for  them. 

It  is  doubtless  true  that  some  other  places  besides 
saloons  use  unsanitary  glasses,  but  this  is  no  excuse 
for  the  saloon,  which  could  well  afford  to  employ 
only  modern  methods  for  cleansing  glassware.  Be- 
sides, the  contents  of  the  glasses  in  these  other  places 
aren't  as  dangerous  in  themselves  as  are  the  contents 
of  the  glasses  used  in  saloons — and  there  aren't  the 
same  chances  for  "catching"  the  diseases  often  found 
among  patronisers  of  some  saloons. 

Dr.  Harvey  W.  Wiley,  pure  food  expert  and  for- 
mer "guardian  of  the  national  digestion,"  who  can- 
not be  regarded  as  a  fanatical  fighter  of  the  liquor 
business,  but  who  must  always  be  considered  as  a 
scientist  who  dares  to  speak  his  convictions,  has  been 
saying  some  mighty  interesting  things  with  regard  to 
the  use  of  intoxicating  liquor. 

Here  are  a  few  brief  but  striking  sentences: 

"At  least  75  per  cent  of  the  whiskey,  beer  and  gin  now 


236  Why  Prohibition! 

sold  in  New  York  would  be  eliminated  if  the  adulterated 
beverages  alone  were  banished. 

"The  people  must  be  educated  up  to  an  understanding  of 
the  harm  which  intoxicants  inflict  upon  them;  they  must 
be  shown  clearly  the  ravages  of  alcohol  upon  the  masses 
of  those  who  use  it,  and  they  must  be  given  definite  proof 
of  the  effect  upon  the  individual.  This  done  the  path  to- 
ward temperance  and  Prohibition  is  well  cleared. 

"All  alcohol  is  harmful  to  the  human  system.  This  is 
admitted  by  the  medical  profession. 

"The  idea  of  nation-wide  Prohibition  appears  to  be  gain- 
ing ground  every  day,  not  only  in  this  country,  but  all  over 
the  world. 

"I  used  to  be  opposed  to  any  legislation  on  the  part  of 
the  State  or  national  government  which  tended  to  limit  the 
right  of  people  to  eat  or  drink  what  they  wished.  I  con- 
sidered it  a  question  of  personal  privilege  which  did  not 
concern  the  State.  My  views  on  this  subject  have  under- 
gone a  radical  change  within  the  last  few  years.  I  recog- 
nised the  fact  that  the  use  and  sale  of  habit-forming  drugs 
should  be  curbed  and  regulated  by  the  government,  acting 
for  the  good  of  society. 

"Then  came  the  question  of  adulterated  foods.  Should  a 
man  be  allowed  to  manufacture  and  sell  foods  which  were 
not  pure,  merely  because  of  the  right  of  each  person  to  eat 
what  he  wished?  If  so,  then  at  least  the  individual  ought 
to  be  allowed  to  know  what  he  is  eating.  The  cause  of  tem- 
perance and  the  abolition  of  alcohol  is  closely  allied  to  both 
these  propositions.  Therefore  I  am  in  favour  of  Prohibi- 
tion." 

And  so  it  goes.    The  leaders  in  every  walk  of  life 


Why  the  Saloon  Must  Go       237 

in  this  and  every  other  country  who  have  the  inter- 
ests of  the  people  at  heart  are  becoming  increas- 
ingly conscious  of  the  effects  of  liquor  and  of  the 
saloon  upon  mankind. 


XI 
Taxation  and  Compensation 

THE  liquor  men  are  telling  us  that  if  saloons  are 
abolished,  the  city  and  the  county  will  lose  all  the 
money  now  being  paid  by  the  liquor  business  in  the 
form  of  taxes. 

If  it  could  be  said  that  the  liquor  business  resulted 
only  in  good,  first  to  those  who  are  engaged  in  it, 
and  second  to  those  who  are  consumers  of  liquor, 
the  money  received  through  the  taxation  of  the  liquor 
business  might  be  regarded  as  a  blessing  to  the  com- 
munity. 

But  we  are  compelled  to  pay  out  in  return  many 
times  more  than  the  taxes  received,  because  of  the 
evils  which  follow  the  consumption  of  intoxicating 
liquor. 

Liquor  is  responsible  for  19  per  cent,  of  the  di- 
vorces, 25  per  cent,  of  the  poverty,  25  per  cent,  of 
the  insanity,  37  per  cent,  of  the  pauperism,  45  per 
cent,  of  the  child  desertion,  and  50  per  cent,  of  the 
crime  in  this  country.  And  this  is  a  very  conserva- 
tive statement. 

If  we  were  to  add  the  expense  of  maintaining  the 
police  departments,  the  cost  of  penitentiaries  and 

238 


Taxation  and  Compensation     239 

asylums  of  various  kinds  that  the  State  is  compelled 
to  support  to  take  care  of  the  wreckage  of  the  liquor 
business,  the  comparatively  small  amount  obtained 
from  the  liquor  tax  would  seem  very  slight  indeed. 

Who  makes  up  the  most  of  this  extra  amount  for 
which  the  liquor  men  do  not  pay  through  their  taxes? 

The  workingman. 

Whoever  else  may  evade  the  payment  of  his  taxes, 
the  workingman  must  pay  every  cent  of  his.  He 
pays  them  when  he  buys  groceries  or  meat  or  shoes 
or  clothing,  or  when  he  pays  his  rent. 

Ordinarily  he  does  not  pay  his  taxes  direct,  and 
so  he  does  not  see  in  exact  figures  just  how  much  the 
saloon  is  actually  costing  him — but  he  can  make  up 
his  mind  that  for  the  most  part  he  is  taking  care  of 
the  wreckage  of  the  saloon. 

How  long  will  the  workingman  be  the  "goat"  of 
the  liquor  business? 

The  United  States  Government  receives  annually 
three  hundred  million  dollars  from  liquor  dealers 
through  the  internal  revenue  tax. 

And  the  liquor  men  are  insisting  that  if  their  busi- 
ness is  destroyed  and  this  sum  of  money  is  no  longer 
paid  into  the  treasury  of  our  country,  we  are  sure 
to  lose  the  war  and  that  other  great  calamities  will 
befall  us. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  who  pays  this  three  hundred 
million  dollars?  Surely  not  the  liquor  men;  it  is  paid 
by  the  consumer — the  man  who  drinks  booze. 

And  what  is  this  three  hundred  million  dollars* 


240  Why  Prohibition! 

used  for  ?    Presumably  it  is  used  to  pay  the  legitimate 
expenses  of  the  Government. 

If  this  is  true,  then  it's  a  fair  tax  for  all  to  pay. 

Why  may  it  not  be  placed  upon  any  commodity 
which  is  generally  used  by  all  the  people  ? 

For  example,  we  spend  as  much  for  bread  and 
clothing  as  we  do  for  booze.  If  the  three  hundred 
million  dollars  now  raised  through  the  internal 
revenue  tax  were  raised  through  taxation  upon  bread 
and  clothing,  it  would  amount  to  just  three  dollars 
per  year  per  person. 

But  this  isn't  what  the  average  workingman  would 
be  compelled  to  pay.  The  apportionment  of  the  en- 
tire sum  would  depend  upon  the  amount  and  quality 
of  the  bread  and  clothing  purchased.  The  well-to- 
do  man  pays  more  for  his  clothing  than  the  working- 
man,  and  he  would  pay  just  that  much  more  in  pro- 
portion of  the  total  tax. 

It  is  altogether  likely  that  the  average  working- 
man  would  not  pay  more  than  one  dollar  per  year— 
the  price  of  a  two-cent  postage  stamp  per  week< — if 
the  entire  internal  revenue  tax  now  paid  by  the  liquor 
men  were  to  be  paid  by  bread  and  clothing  manufac- 
turers. 

And  it  will  be  worth  an  extra  two-cent  postage 
stamp  each  week  to  live  in  the  United  States  with 
all  the  saloons  wiped  out. 

Furthermore,  our  general  expenditures  will  be 
reduced  by  three  hundred  million  dollars  if  the 
saloons  are  abolished,  because  it  will  no  longer  be 


Taxation  and  Compensation     241 

necessary  to  take  care  of  the  wreckage  of  the  liquor 
business.  It  is  altogether  likely  that  we  are  paying 
fully  as  much  as  this  through  indirect  taxation  be- 
cause the  saloons  exist,  and  many  of  us  are  called 
upon  to  privately  take  care  of  many  of  those  who 
have  been  wrecked  by  the  liquor  business. 

And  again,  the  transfer  of  money  now  invested  in 
the  liquor  business  to  legitimate  industry  will  em- 
ploy 250,000  wage-earners — four  times  as  many 
wage-earners  as  are  now  employed  in  the  manufac- 
ture of  liquor. 

There  are  other  important  advantages  which 
would  come  to  us  were  we  to  obtain  in  other  ways 
the  amount  now  raised  through  the  internal  revenue 
tax  upon  the  liquor  business. 

Professor  Irving  Fisher,  of  Yale  University,  re- 
cently said: 

"It  is  penny-wise  and  pound-foolish  to  argue  that  prohi- 
bition destroys  revenue — it  simply  requires  a  transfer  of  taxes 
from  alcoholic  beverages  to  non-alcoholic  beverages  and  the 
other  productions  to  which  our  energies  would  be  trans- 
ferred. The  net  result  will  obviously  not  be  additional  eco- 
nomic or  tax  burdens,  but  quite  the  contrary.  One  might 
as  well  argue  against  a  public  health  measure  to  reduce  the 
death  rate  on  the  grounds  that  it  would  reduce  inheritance 
taxes.  To  keep  alcohol  for  revenue  is  as  comical  as  Charles 
Lamb's  description  of  the  Chinese  method  of  roasting  a  pig 
by  burning  down  a  house  with  the  pig  inside." 

We  need  not  be  at  all  alarmed  as  to  what  will 


242  Why  Prohibition! 

become  of  the  United  States  if  the  liquor  men  no 
longer  make  us  a  "present"  of  the  three  hundred 
million  dollars  they  talk  so  much  about. 

It  is  almost  pathetic  that  so  many  people  are  de- 
luded by  the  liquor  men's  arguments  that  if  the 
saloon  is  abolished,  the  taxes  will  be  so  greatly  in- 
creased that  their  homes  and  their  businesses  will  be 
lost. 

Let's  assume  that  a  town  of  20,000  has  twenty 
saloons,  each  of  which  pays  one  thousand  dollars 
per  year  for  a  license  fee  making  a  total  of  twenty 
thousand  dollars.  The  city  would  probably  receive 
about  fifteen  thousand  dollars  of  this  amount  be- 
cause the  remainder  would  go  to  the  State. 

Now,  of  course,  the  saloons  in  the  town  will  have 
much  of  this  fifteen  thousand  dollars  returned  to 
them  in  the  form  of  police  protection  and  other  ad- 
vantages which  come  to  the  liquor  business,  because 
it  is  located  in  a  well  protected  community. 

But  in  order  to  secure  the  fifteen  thousand  dol- 
lars in  question,  the  people  of  the  city  are  compelled 
to  spend  three  hundred  thousand  dollars  over  the 
bars! — Isn't  this  a  wonderful  financial  system? 

Suppose  the  three  hundred  thousand  dollars  spent 
in  the  saloons  of  the  city  were  spent  in  other  stores 
in  town  ?  There  is  no  doubt  that  a  very  considerable 
number  of  additional  clerks  would  be  engaged  and 
every  merchant  in  town  would  be  so  much  more 
prosperous  that  he  would  pay  a  larger  tax  because 
of  his  increased  income  and  in  the  end  the  city  would 


Taxation  and  Compensation     243 

be  much  better  off  than  it  was  when  the  three  hun- 
dred thousand  dollars  were  spent  in  the  saloons. 

Assuming  that  there  were  absolutely  no  other 
method  whereby  the  fifteen  thousand  dollars  re- 
ceived from  the  saloons  could  be  raised,  and  that  it 
would  come  directly  out  of  the  pockets  of  the  peo- 
ple, how  much  would  it  mean  for  each  person  in 
town?  Fifteen  thousand  dollars  divided  among 
twenty  thousand  people  would  amount  to  seventy- 
five  cents  per  year — and  this  would  "break"  every 
householder  in  town — wouldn't  it — just  about  one 
cent  and  a  half  per  week! 

Now  that  the  liquor  business  is  on  the  run  and 
even  the  liquor  men  themselves  see  their  finish,  they 
are  beginning  to  talk  about  compensation — they  want 
the  State  to  pay  them  for  the  "loss"  of  their  busi- 
ness. 

Before  we  begin  to  pay  over  any  money  to  the 
liquor  men,  let's  look  at  a  few  perfectly  plain  facts. 

First: — No  liquor  license  is  issued  for  more  than 
one  year  at  a  time  and  no  saloonkeeper  has  a  right 
to  expect  that  he  shall  be  permitted  to  remain  in 
business  for  a  longer  period.  If  he  desires  to  make 
improvements  in  his  enterprise,  he  does  so  at  his 
own  risk;  he  cannot  expect  the  rest  of  us  to  pay  for 
his  losses  in  this  respect. 

Second: — No  man  has  any  right  to  hold  or  use 
property  of  any  kind  for  any  injurious  purpose  in 
any  community.  The  courts  have  repeatedly  said 


244  Why  Prohibition! 

that  the  saloon  is  a  distinct  detriment  to  every  com- 
munity. 

Third:, — It  is  not  true  that  property  upon  which 
liquor  has  been  made  or  sold  is  confiscated  through 
prohibition.  The  land  values  remain  the  same;  the 
buildings  and  much  of  the  machinery  may  be  used 
for  other  purposes,  as  is  being  demonstrated  in  every 
part  of  the  United  States  where  the  liquor  business 
has  been  destroyed.  The  property  is  never  taken 
from  the  owner — although  it  should  be  remembered 
that  the  use  of  property  by  liquor  dealers  usually 
reduces  the  value  of  nearby  property. 

Fourth : — Saloon  fighters  are  willing  to  grant  com- 
pensation to  liquor  men  provided  it  is  done  in  a 
legal  manner.  Waiving  all  technical  terms,  such 
matters  are  usually  decided  by  taking  into  account 
the  losses  sustained  by  both  parties  in  question. 

Let  the  saloon  men  make  a  statement  as  to  the 
amount  of  money  which  they  have  actually  lost 
through  the  abolition  of  their  business  and  then  let 
the  City  and  the  County  and  the  State  bring  in  their 
bills  against  the  saloons  for  the  extra  expense  to 
which  they  have  been  put  in  taking  care  of  the  wreck- 
age of  the  liquor  business  in  public  institutions. 

And  then,  if  it  is  at  all  possible,  let  us  express  in 
the  terms  of  cold  cash  the  hot  anguish  of  men,  women 
and  children  who  have  suffered  because  of  the  exist- 
ence of  the  liquor  business. 

The  chances  are  when  the  books  are  balanced,  that 
the  liquor  men  will  be  paying  money  into  the  Treas- 


Taxation  and  Compensation     245 

ury  of  the  State,  instead  of  the  State  paying  money  to 
the  liquor  men. 

And  this  is  the  only  legal  way  whereby  the  ques- 
tion of  compensation  may  be  settled.  This  country 
has  already  outlawed  slavery,  polygamy,  the  lottery 
and  the  opium  traffic  and  those  who  suffered  financial 
loss  were  not  compensated,  because  Governments 
never  compensate  those  engaged  in  immoral  pur- 
suits or  in  a  traffic  which  is  against  the  public  wel- 
fare, and  precisely  the  same  principle  applies  to  the 
liquor  traffic. 

The  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States  has  said 
"All  property  in  the  United  States  is  held  upon  the 
implied  condition  that  the  owner's  use  of  it  shall  not 
be  injurious  to  the  community." 

The  Supreme  Court  of  Ohio  has  said:  "When  a 
man  invests  his  money  in  the  liquor  traffic,  he  takes 
the  risk  of  having  his  property  destroyed  by  State 
action  to  save  society  from  the  evils  of  his  busi- 


ness." 


The  United  States  Supreme  Court  has  said :  "The 
police  power  of  the  State  is  fully  competent  to  regu- 
late the  liquor  business,  to  mitigate  its  evils  or  to  sup- 
press it  entirely." 

It  would  be  as  fair  to  compensate  a  burglar  when 
taking  away  his  tools  as  to  compensate  liquor  men 
when  the  State  can  no  longer  tolerate  the  work  of 
destruction  carried  on  by  the  liquor  business. 

The  arguments  of  the  liquor  men  regarding  com- 
pensation are  based  upon  the  assumption  that  they 


246  Why  Prohibition! 

are  conducting  a  legitimate  industry,  having  the  same 
legal  status  as  have  dealers  in  food,  clothes  or  house- 
hold goods,  but  the  courts  have  denied  to  it  all 
natural  or  inherent  rights  of  commerce.  Its  status 
before  the  law  is  that  of  a  legalised  outlaw. 

The  United  States  Supreme  Court  has  declared, 
"There  is  no  inherent  right  in  a  citizen  to  sell  in- 
toxicating liquors  by  retail;  it  is  not  a  privilege  of  a 
citizen  of  the  state,  or  of  a  citizen  of  the  United 
States0" 

The  authority  for  outlawing  the  traffic  at  will  of 
•  he  Government  is  given  in  these  words:  "As  it  is  a 
business  attended  with  danger  to  the  community  it 
may  be  entirely  prohibited,  or  be  permitted  under 
such  conditions  as  shall  limit  to  the  utmost  its  evils. 
The  manner  and  extent  of  regulation  rest  in  the  dis- 
cretion of  the  governing  authority." 

Samuel  Wilson,  of  the  Anti-Saloon  League  of  New 
Jersey  in  his  pamphlet  entitled  "Compensation,"  calls 
attention  to  some  interesting  facts  regarding  this 
subject. 

He  says: 

"Prohibition  is  the  basic  law,  modified  by  authority  to 
grant  the  privilege  to  sell  upon  specified  conditions.  In 
New  Jersey  the  opening  words  of  the  Werts  Act,  which  is 
the  general  license  law,  are  'Hereafter  no  license  to  keep 
an  inn  or  tavern  or  to  sell  shall  be  granted  except,  etc.'  " 

"A  license  is  merely  a  temporary  suspension  of 
prohibition,"  says  Mr.  Wilson.  Any  person  who 


Taxation  and  Compensation     247 

does  not  buy  this  temporary  immunity  from  the  pen- 
alties that  attach  to  the  sale  of  alcoholic  liquor  is 
under  a  prohibition  law  and  becomes  a  criminal  if 
he  deals  in  liquor. 

Those  who  advocate  compensation  insist  that  the 
Government  is  a  partner  in  the  saloon  business  and 
as  a  fair  partner  must  help  stand  the  loss  when  the 
business  is  abolished.  But  Mr.  Wilson  points  out 
that  a  partnership  is  a  business  agreement  with 
mutual  investments  and  mutual  sharings  of  profits 
and  losses.  The  relation  between  Government  and 
the  saloon  has  nothing  whatever  to  do  with  profits 
or  losses. 

If  the  collection  of  revenue  constitutes  Uncle  Sam 
a  partner,  then  like  collections  from  dealers  in  to- 
bacco or  oleomargarine,  and  the  duties  paid  by  im- 
porters of  a  thousand  articles  of  commerce,  the 
internal  revenue  tax  on  sales  of  stock,  telegraph  and 
telephone  messages,  railway  and  sleeping  car  tickets, 
makes  him  a  profit-sharer  in  all  these  varied  indus- 
tries. 

Municipalities  collect  license  fees  from  owners  of 
dogs.  Are  they  partners  in  the  ownership  and  jointly 
responsible  with  the  master  of  the  dog  should  it  bite 
a  citizen? 

What  about  peddlers  and  jitney  drivers — is  the 
Government  in  partnership  with  these,  simply  be- 
cause they  pay  the  Government  a  license  ? 

The  compensation  argument  is  an  assumption  that 
the  license  granted  to  a  dealer,  or  the  receipt  for 


248  Why  Prohibition! 

taxes  paid  to  the  Federal  Government,  have  intrinsic 
value  as  property.  It  is  the  refusal  to  reissue  the 
privilege  to  sell  that  raises  objections  from  the  out- 
lawed liquor  dealers — the  real  property  losses  are 
merely  incidental. 

As  expressed  in  a  decision  of  the  Supreme  Court 
of  the  State  of  New  Jersey,  written  by  the  Chief 
Justice:  "License  is  in  no  sense  property.  It  is  a 
mere  temporary  permit  to  do  what  otherwise  would 
be  illegal,  issued  in  the  exercise  of  the  police  power." 

The  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States  ren- 
dered the  following  decision  in  1887: 

"There  is  here  no  justification  for  holding  that  the  State, 
under  the  guise  merely  of  police  regulation,  is  aiming  to 
deprive  the  citizen  of  his  constitutional  rights;  for  we  can- 
not shut  out  of  view  the  fact,  within  the  knowledge  of  all, 
that  the  public  health,  the  public  morals  and  the  public 
safety  may  be  endangered  by  the  general  use  of  intoxicating 
drinks;  nor  the  fact,  established  by  statistics  accessible  to 
every  one,  that  the  disorder,  pauperism  and  crime  prevalent 
in  the  country  are  in  some  degree  at  least  traceable  to  this 
evil. 

"The  principle  that  no  person  shall  be  deprived  of  life, 
liberty  or  property  without  due  process  of  law,  was  em- 
bodied in  substance,  in  the  constitutions  of  nearly  all,  if 
not  all,  of  the  several  states  at  the  time  of  the  adoption  of 
the  1 4th  amendment,  and  it  has  never  been  regarded  as 
incompatible  with  the  principle,  equally  vital,  because  essen- 
tial to  the  peace  and  safety  of  society,  that  all  property  in 


Taxation  and  Compensation     249 

this  country  is  held  under  the  implied  obligation  that  the 
owner's  use  of  it  shall  not  be  injurious  to  the  community. 

"Such  legislation  does  not  disturb  the  owner  in  the  con- 
trol or  use  of  his  property  for  lawful  purposes,  nor  restrict 
his  right  to  dispose  of  it,  but  is  only  a  declaration  by  the 
State  that  its  use  by  any  one  for  certain  forbidden  purposes 
is  prejudicial  to  the  public  interests.  Nor  can  legislation 
of  that  character  come  within  the  I4th  amendment  in  any 
case,  unless  it  is  apparent  that  its  real  object  is  not  to  pro- 
tect the  community  or  to  promote  the  general  well-being,  but, 
under  the  guise  of  police  regulations,  to  deprive  the  owner 
of  his  liberty  and  property  without  due  process  of  law. 

"The  power  which  the  states  unquestionably  have  of 
prohibiting  such  use  of  individuals  of  their  property  as  will 
be  prejudicial  to  the  health,  the  morals  or  the  safety  of  the 
public  is  not,  and — consistently  with  the  existence  and 
safety  of  organised  society — cannot  be  burdened  with  the 
condition  that  the  State  must  compensate  such  individual 
owners  for  pecuniary  losses  they  sustain,  by  reason  of  their 
not  being  permitted  by  a  noxious  use  of  their  property  to 
inflict  injury  upon  the  community.  The  exercise  of  the 
police  power  by  the  destruction  of  property  which  is  itself 
a  public  nuisance,  or  the  prohibition  of  its  use  in  a  particular 
way,  whereby  its  value  becomes  depreciated,  is  very  different 
from  taking  property  for  public  use,  or  from  depriving  a 
person  of  his  property  without  due  process  of  law.  In  the 
one  case,  a  nuisance  only  is  abated ;  in  the  other,  unoffending 
property  is  taken  away  from  an  innocent  owner." 

And  here  is  another  decision  of  the  United  States 
Supreme  Court  in  the  case  of  California  versus 


250  Why  Prohibition! 

Christensen  in  which  it  is  pointed  out  that  no  man 
has  an  inherent  right  to  sell  liquor: 

"It  is  urged  that  as  the  liquors  are  used  as  a  beverage, 
and  the  injury  following  them,  if  used  in  excess,  is  volun- 
tarily inflicted,  and  is  confined  to  the  party  offending,  their 
sale  should  be  without  restriction,  the  contention  being  that 
what  a  man  shall  drink,  equally  with  what  he  shall  eat,  is 
not  properly  a  matter  for  legislation. 

"There  is  in  this  position  an  assumption  of  fact  which  does 
not  exist,  that  when  the  liquors  are  taken  in  excess  the  in- 
juries are  confined  to  the  party  offending.  The  injury,  it  is 
true,  falls  first  upon  him  in  his  health,  which  the  habit  un- 
dermines; in  his  morals,  which  it  weakens;  and  in  the  self- 
abasement  which  it  creates.  But  as  it  leads  to  neglect  of 
business  and  waste  of  property  and  general  demoralisation 
it  affects  those  who  are  immediately  connected  with  and 
dependent  upon  him.  By  the  general  concurrence  of  opinion 
in  every  Christian  and  civilised  community,  there  are  few 
sources  of  crime  and  misery  to  society  equal  to  the  dram- 
shop, where  intoxicating  liquors  in  small  quantities,  to  be 
drunk  at  the  time,  are  sold  indiscriminately  to  all  parties 
applying.  The  statistics  of  every  State  show  a  greater 
amount  of  crime  and  misery  attributable  to  the  use  of  ardent 
spirits  obtained  in  these  retail  liquor  saloons  than  to  any 
other  source. 

"The  sale  of  such  liquors  in  this  way  has,  therefore,  been, 
at  all  times  by  the  Courts  of  every  State,  considered  as  the 
proper  subject  of  legislative  action.  Not  only  may  a  license 
be  exacted  from  the  keeper  of  the  saloon  before  a  glass  of 
his  liquor  can  thus  be  disposed  of,  but  restrictions  may  be 
imposed  as  to  the  class  of  persons  to  whom  they  may  be 


Taxation  and  Compensation     251 

sold,  and  the  hours  of  the  day,  and  the  days  of  the  week 
on  which  the  saloons  may  be  opened.  Their  sale  in  that 
form  may  be  absolutely  prohibited.  There  is  no  inherent 
right  in  the  citizen  to  sell  intoxicating  liquors  by  retail;  it 
is  not  a  privilege  of  a  citizen  of  the  State  or  of  a  citizen  of 
the  United  States.  As  it  is  a  business  attended  with  danger 
to  the  community,  it  may,  as  already  said,  be  entirely  pro- 
hibited, or  be  permitted  under  such  conditions  as  will  limit 
to  the  utmost  its  evils.  The  manner  and  extent  of  regula- 
tion rest  in  the  discretion  of  the  governing  authority." 

If  no  man  may  use  his  property  to  the  injury  of 
society,  then,  by  the  same  token,  no  man  may  use  his 
labour  power  to  the  injury  of  society. 

If  it  is  wrong  for  one  man  to  run  a  saloon  be- 
cause were  he  to  do  so  it  would  hurt  his  fellowman, 
it  is  equally  wrong  for  another  man  to  manufacture 
the  material  which  may  afterward  be  sold  to  the 
hurt  of  his  fellowman. 

Every  argument  that  one  uses  against  the  saloon- 
keeper may  be  used,  in  principle,  at  any  rate,  against 
the  workingman  who  is  employed  as  a  brewer,  a  dis- 
tiller, a  rectifier  or  a  maltster,  to  say  nothing  about 
the  bartender. 


XII 
Substitutes  for  the  Saloon 

iWlTH  the  closing  of  the  saloon  in  so  many  states 
there  has  naturally  arisen  a  desire  to  provide  sub- 
stitutes. It  is  the  old  story  of  the  penalty  of  prog- 
ress— in  ending  old  abuses,  we  create  new  problems. 
Long  ago  we  were  taught  the  lesson  that  a  house 
"swept  and  garnished"  is  not  sufficient  and  this  has 
a  most  vital  relationship  to  the  question  of  nation-  or 
state-wide  prohibition. 

It  is  foolish  to  insist  that  the  saloon  never  served 
any  good  purpose.  It  is  true  that  the  good  in  the 
saloon  was  out-weighed  by  the  evil  that  was  in  them 
— but  there  was  good — it  meant  a  great  deal  to  many 
of  those  who  patronised  it.  The  fact  that  the  sa- 
loons are  closed  does  not  necessarily  prove  that  the 
needs  of  these  men  no  longer  exist. 

We  have  been  discussing  the  bad  features  of  the 
saloon.  Let  us  consider  some  of  its  strong  points 
in  order  to  find  out  just  what  is  required  to  provide 
those  things  which  must  take  their  places. 

What  is  it  that  makes  the  saloon  so  attractive? 
The  fundamental  reason  must  be  that  it  supplies  in 
a  natural  manner  the  demand  for  a  social  centre,  be- 

252 


Substitutes  for  the  Saloon       253 

cause  everywhere  men  accept  it  as  an  agency  which 
ministers  to  certain  social  needs. 

It  is  not  the  drinking  habit  alone — strong  as  this 
may  be.  It  is  quite  true  that  a  considerable  number 
of  men  have  said  that  the  only  thing  that  drove  them 
to  the  saloon  was  the  desire  for  strong  drink,  and 
they  are  impatient  with  others  who  declare  that  this 
was  not  the  chief  attraction  for  them.  But  they  must 
not  judge  all  others  by  their  own  tastes  and  inclina- 
tions. 

Several  outstanding  peculiarities  immediately 
strike  one  as  the  saloon  is  studied.  In  the  first  place, 
there  is  the  perfectly  natural  way  in  which  the  saloon 
is  conducted.  There's  nothing  strained  about  it. 
Men  aren't  made  too  welcome.  Few  restrictions  are 
imposed.  Those  who  conduct  the  place  make  them- 
selves as  inconspicuous  and  as  unobtrusive  as  they 
can.  They  believe  in  the  saying,  "I  must  decrease, 
while  my  customer  must  increase";  at  least  this  is 
the  practise  in  the  best  and  most  successful  saloons. 

Those  who  patronise  the  saloon  usually  have  noth- 
ing special  done  for  them.  They  pay  for  what  they 
get,  and  they  do  it  cheerfully — often  hilariously. 
There's  a  spirit  of  democracy  about  the  saloon  which 
is  tremendously  appealing.  A  five  cent  piece  places 
the  average  man  upon  an  equality  with  everybody 
else  in  the  place. 

When  I  was  in  the  machine  shop  and  attended  the 
meetings  of  my  labour  organisation,  we  met  in  the 
back  room  of  a  saloon.  We  met  there  for  two  rea- 


254  Why  Prohibition! 

sons :  first,  oecause  the  saloonkeeper  charged  no  rent 
for  the  use  of  the  hall,  and  second,  because  there  was 
no  other  place  in  which  we  could  meet,  as  every  hall 
in  that  part  of  the  city  which  was  at  all  convenient 
was  owned  by  a  saloonkeeper.  Because  saloonkeep- 
ers have  a  monopoly  of  most  of  the  cheap  halls  in 
the  larger  cities,  they  become  the  meeting  places  of 
social  clubs,  labour  unions,  lodges  and  practically 
every  other  organisation  of  the  poorer  people. 

Here,  too,  they  have  their  christenings,  their  wed- 
dings, their  dances  and  other  social  functions,  espe- 
cially among  the  immigrant  populations.  Unless 
they  are  connected  in  some  way  with  the  church, 
most  of  the  people  in  the  community  look  upon  the 
saloon  as  the  social  clearing  house  of  the  neighbour- 
hood. It  is  from  here  that  the  gossip  of  the  neigh- 
bourhood goes  out.  It  is  to  the  saloons  that  the 
political  parties  often  look  for  their  greatest  strength. 
A  famous  New  York  politician  once  said  that  he 
would  rather  have  one  saloon  back  him  than  ten 
churches. 

The  thing  that  impresses  one  about  the  saloon  is 
that  it  is  always  handy — it  is  always  there.  You  will 
find  it  in  the  most  prominent  places  in  the  city,  for 
saloonkeepers  usually  select  the  best  sites  in  town. 

Saloons  are  well  lighted  and  they  are  warm  in  win- 
ter and  cool  in  summer.  Did  you  ever  realise  how 
attractive  is  the  free  lunch  offered  by  the  saloon- 
keeper? It  is  usually  served  in  an  appetising  man- 
ner and  in  almost  unlimited  quantities.  The  saloon 


Substitutes  for  the  Saloon       255 

daily  feeds  thousands  of  clerks  and  workingmen  who 
thus  secure  their  noonday  luncheon  for  the  cost  of 
two  glasses  of  beer  and  often  for  the  cost  of  only 
one.  Frequently  a  small  charge  is  made  for  a  special 
lunch  which  is  far  superior  to  the  unattractive  meals 
served  in  the  cheap,  dirty  restaurants  to  which  many 
otherwise  would  be  compelled  to  go. 

It  is  quite  a  common  thing  for  a  man  who  is 
"broke"  to  go  into  a  saloon  and  if  he  doesn't  look 
like  an  out  and  out  hobo  or  bum,  he  is  invited  to 
take  some  of  the  lunch — and  he  isn't  asked  to  "go 
slow"  on  the  lunch  either.  "Let  no  hungry  man  pass 
my  door,"  reads  a  sign  in  front  of  a  Buffalo  saloon. 

N  ?r  is  the  man  who  has  only  five  cents  in  his 
pocket  compelled  to  drink  beer  in  order  to  get  the 
free  lunch — he  may  have  a  glass  of  milk  or  soda 
water,  ginger  ale  or  some  other  soft  drink  and  he 
will  be  treated  just  as  courteously  as  though  he  drank 
straight-out  booze. 

Here's  the  story  of  a  workingman-preacher's  ex- 
perience— one  who  went  out  to  see  what  it  was  like 
to  live  as  an  ordinary  man — he  worked  at  his  trade 
of  carpenter. 

One  time,  two  days  before  pay  day,  he  had  no 
money  and  he  went  into  a  bakery  to  ask  for  enough 
bread  to  last  until  Saturday,  when  he  should  receive 
his  pay,  offering  to  leave  his  hammer,  for  which  he 
had  no  immediate  use,  as  a  guarantee  that  he  would 
pay.  But  the  baker  would  have  nothing  to  do  with 
him.  He  then  tried  another  tradesman  with  like 


256  Why  Prohibition! 

results,  and  then  he  went  into  a  saloon  where  he  had 
eaten  his  luncheon  several  times  and  without  any 
hesitancy  the  bartender  said  to  him  "sure,  come  in 
and  eat  what  you  like,  and  if  you  want  to,  come  in 
again — you  look  square" — and  he  wouldn't  take  the 
hammer. 

The  saloonkeeper  himself  is  a  factor  in  the  prob- 
lem. His  cordial  greeting,  his  neat  appearance,  his 
large  acquaintance,  not  only  with  the  men  in  the 
community,  but  beyond,  his  superior  sources  of  in- 
formation, make  him  a  great  influence.  Often  he  se- 
cures work  for  both  the  workingman  and  his  chil- 
dren. He  loans  him  money  without  setting  up  the 
"work  test"  of  the  charity  organisation  societies. 
No  questions  are  asked  as  to  whether  or  not  the 
recipient  is  deserving;  frequently  he  lends  "hoping 
nothing  in  return." 

This  is  part  of  the  general  business  policy  of  the 
saloon,  which  depends  so  largely  upon  the  spirit  of 
good  fellowship  which  must  be  of  first  importance 
in  the  successful  conduct  of  the  enterprise.  The  sa- 
loonkeeper understands  human  nature.  This  is  his 
chief  stock  in  trade.  It  is  his  business  to  attract 
men  and  to  so  attract  them  that  they  will  continue 
to  make  his  place  a  permanent  rendezvous.  He  seeks 
to  secure  as  much  transient  trade  as  possible  but  his 
chief  dependence  is  upon  the  men  who  come  day 
after  day  and  night  after  night  bringing  their  friends 
with  them.  It  is  the  treating  habit  that  makes  the 
saloon  business  pay. 


Substitutes  for  the  Saloon       257 

Comparatively  few — excepting  those  conducting 
the  lower  kinds  of  saloons — will  permit  a  man  to 
become  intoxicated  in  their  places;  they  will  not 
permit  swearing,  indecent  stories  are  prohibited,  no 
gambling  is  allowed.  Many  of  their  families  are  in 
the  churches,  not  only  in  the  Catholic  churches  but 
in  the  Protestant  as  well.  None  treat  the  preacher 
more  cordially  than  the  saloonkeeper  when  the  min- 
ister makes  a  pastoral  call. 

In  short,  the  saloonkeeper  is  decidedly  a  human 
being;  this  must  be  taken  into  account  in  dealing 
with  him.  Those  who  patronise  the  saloon  smile  at 
the  caricatures  of  the  saloonkeeper  that  appear  in 
some  temperance  journals,  showing  him  as  a  creature 
with  cloven  hoofs  and  a  demon's  face.  Such  a  person 
would  attract  no  one — least  of  all  a  man  who  is 
searching  for  a  place  that  will  satisfy  his  social 
needs. 

Some  of  those  who  have  studied  the  saloon  and 
seen  the  natural  attractions,  have  thought  that  the 
saloon  itself  might  be  reformed  and  used  as  a  "sub- 
stitute." 

The  "Subway  Tavern"  was  perhaps  the  most  con- 
spicuous illustration  of  such  attempts.  Every  pos- 
sible objection  that  had  been  raised  against  the  or- 
dinary saloon  was  considered  in  this  enterprise  in- 
augurated by  Bishop  Potter  and  his  friends  in  lower 
New  York. 

This  was  to  be  an  "ideal"  saloon.  It  was  to  be 
demonstrated  that  a  saloon  in  which  intoxicating 


258  Why  Prohibition! 

liquors  were  sold  could  be  so  conducted  for  the  bene- 
fit of  workingmen  as  to  make  it  practically  free  from 
the  evils  which  are  now  charged  against  regular 
drinking  places. 

After  a  year's  trial  the  institution  was  voted  a  com- 
plete failure.  Whatever  may  have  been  the  causes 
which  led  to  its  discontinuance,  it  is  interesting  to 
note  the  comments  of  the  purchaser  who  afterward 
ran  it  as  a  common  bar. 

On  the  walls  of  this  saloon  which  reverted  to  its 
original  type  he  posted  cards  bearing  these  sen- 
tences : 

"Rum  and  religion  won't  mix  any  more  than  oil  and 
water." 

"You  cannot  follow  the  Lord  and  chase  the  devil  at  the 
same  time." 

"A  saloon  is  a  place  for  drink,  not  worship." 

"Religion  follows  rum;  it  does  not  go  with  it  hand  in 
hand.  A  man  thinks  of  religion  the  morning  after." 

"You  cannot  boom  drink  and  temperance  too." 

"Running  a  saloon  by  telling  people  of  the  deadly  effects 
of  rum  is  like  telling  a  man  to  please  buy  poison  because 
the  undertaker  needs  the  money." 

"The  best  patron  of  a  saloon  is  the  man  with  the  biggest 
thirst,  not  the  man  with  the  most  religion." 

"They  sang  the  Doxology  when  they  opened  the  place. 
We'll  sing — 'Here's  to  good  old  wine/  " 

This  was  really  another  illustration  of  the  fact 
that  the  saloon  cannot  be  reformed,  because  the  basis 
of  its  business  is  bad. 


Substitutes  for  the  Saloon       259 

But  what  about  a  substitute  for  the  saloon — what 
can  take  its  place? 

-There  is  no  panacea — no  one  thing  that  can  take 
the  place  of  the  saloon.  An  institution  which  has  in 
it  so  many  serious  objections — many  of  which  con- 
stitute its  main  charm  and  attractiveness  for  those 
who  patronise  it — cannot  very  well  be  duplicated 
minus  all  these  features  and  still  be  a  success. ; 

What  we  need  to  do  is  to  try  to  discover  what  are 
the  really  good  features  of  the  saloon,  and  then  to 
incorporate  them  in  existing  agencies  or  organise 
new  ones  which  will  meet  the  situation. 

It  cannot  be  urged  too  strongly  upon  those  who 
are  studying  the  question  of  saloon  substitutes  that 
they  must  be  willing  to  study  all  the  conditions  which 
are  involved.  If  they  expect  some  one  to  present 
them  with  a  set  of  blue  prints,  or  diagrams,  with 
rules  and  regulations  for  running  a  saloon  substitute, 
they  are  destined  to  be  very  much  disappointed. 
There  are  no  such  specifications. 

It  is  essential  to  make  a  social  "survey"  or  study 
of  the  problem  in  the  local  community.  This  does 
not  necessitate  a  complicated  investigation,  but  it 
means  among  other  things,  that  one  must  know  some- 
thing about  the  kind  of  men  for  whom  the  saloon 
substitute  is  to  be  provided.  For  the  "lumber-jack" 
a  substitute  is  required  which  is  quite  different  from 
that  provided  for  the  young  men  in  a  country  village. 
Sailors  who  frequent  our  coast  cities  are  in  a  class 
by  themselves.  Skilled  artisans  in  manufacturing 


260  Why  Prohibition! 

centres  have  ideas  of  their  own  as  to  what  they  want. 
Different  groups  of  foreign-speaking  workers  must 
be  studied  systematically,  for  they  have  their  pecu- 
liar prejudices,  their  likes  and  dislikes. 

Most  commonly  one  hears  that  coffee  houses  will 
supply  all  the  needs  of  those  who  formerly  patron- 
ised the  saloons,  but  this  is  usually  true  only  when 
conducted  for  such  groups  as  cabmen,  teamsters,  or 
other  street  or  night  workers  who  patronise  them 
mostly  for  the  sake  of  the  hot  drinks  which  they  need 
on  cold  winter  days  or  nights.  For  these  the  well- 
known  wagons  or  small  stands  on  wheels  are  best 
suited. 

Reading-rooms  may  be  very  easily  organised,  but 
they  are  exceedingly  difficult  to  maintain  under  or- 
dinary circumstances,  largely  because  they  lack  the 
efficient  management  which  one  finds  in  a  public 
library,  for  example,  where  the  service  is  continu- 
ous, well  ordered  and  fairly  complete.  There  is  no 
reason,  however,  why  a  successful  reading-room  may 
not  be  conducted  separate  and  apart  from  a  public 
library,  but  as  a  rule,  if  there  are  ample  facilities  in 
the  public  library  this  serves  all  the  purposes  of  this 
kind  required,  and  should  be  heartily  supported  by 
anti-saloon  fighters. 

A  well  set-up  soft  drink  parlor  and  billiard  room 
combined  may  be  successfully  conducted — assuming 
that  the  management  is  broad  enough  to  understand 
just  what  the  requirements  are. 

"Comfort  stations"  or  public  toilets  are  one  of 


Substitutes  for  the  Saloon       261 

the  greatest  needs  in  the  average  city.  Large  num- 
bers of  men  patronise  saloons  merely  for  the  pur- 
pose of  using  the  toilet  facilities  which  are  freely 
offered,  and,  of  course,  they  feel  the  necessity  of 
taking  a  drink  when  passing  through  the  barroom., 

Motion  picture  houses  have  undoubtedly  proven 
themselves  to  be  the  chief  rivals  of  the  saloon. 
Nothing  else  quite  approaches  them  in  this  respect, 
and  the  motion  picture  house,  when  properly  con- 
ducted, often  serves  as  a  saloon  substitute  without 
any  further  thought  on  the  part  of  those  who  are 
concerned  about  the  question  from  the  anti-saloon 
standpoint. 

Saloonkeepers  have  realised  that  the  movie  is  sup- 
planting the  saloon  in  the  big  town,  and  they  are  or- 
ganising to  fight  it.  And  when  the  saloonkeepers  or- 
ganise to  fight  motion  picture  houses  it  is  a  sign  that 
the  picture  shows  are  either  very,  very  bad,  or  very, 
very  good — that  they  are  so  much  worse  than  the 
saloon  that  even  a  saloonkeeper  cannot  stand  for 
them,  or  else  that  they  are  so  much  better  than  the 
saloon  that  they  threaten  to  injure  the  saloonkeep- 
er's business.  There  is  no  doubt  that  the  latter  is 
the  actual  situation. 

"The  liquor  industry  has  not  appreciated  the  scope 
of  the  moving  pictures  in  their  harmful  effects  on  the 
liquor  business,"  says  the  editor  of  Mida's  Criterion 
— a  liquor  man's  paper. 

He  insists  that  liquor  is  always  portrayed  in  a  most 
unfavourable  light  by  the  movies;  udrink  bouts, 


262  Why  Prohibition! 

cabarets  that  are  draining  youth  of  manhood,  and 
maidenhood  of  virginity,  murders  following  the  use 
of  the  bottle  and  pretty  nearly  everything  else  that 
makes  liquor  the  arch-villain,  will  be  found  nightly 
in  most  of  the  picture  theatres  in  this  country,"  says 
the  editor  of  this  liquor  paper. 

Very  rarely  does  the  movie  present  the  drinking 
of  booze  as  a  habit  which  makes  for  better  manhood 
and  womanhood.  It  is  usually  the  villain  or  the 
fool  in  the  play  who  is  given  the  part  of  the  booze 
drinker.  No  wonder  that  the  editor  of  Mida's 
Criterion  is  dispirited  and  that  he  asks  plaintively, 
"What  are  we  going  to  do  about  the  MOVIE 
MENACE?  That's  its  name  in  capital  letters.  It 
is  the  subtle,  insidious,  back-door  gossip  of  the  liquor 
industry,  and  it  has  made  a  million  hammers,  but 
not  one  solitary  horn  for  the  liquor  business !" 

And  the  editor  ought  to  know ! 

If  what  the  liquor  men  say  regarding  the  movies 
is  true  every  one  who  is  opposed  to  the  saloon  should 
come  out  strong  for  the  motion  picture  house. 

Nobody  knows  just  how  many  motion  picture 
houses  there  are  in  this  country,  but  15,000  would 
probably  be  a  conservative  estimate.  If  the  average 
daily  attendance  for  each  of  the  15,000  motion  pic- 
ture houses  is  400,  about  6,000,000  people  see  the 
movies  every  day.  Anyway,  it's  safe  to  say  that 
every  week  25,000,000  people  "take  in"  the  movies. 
And  if  these  25,000,000  "movie  fans"  are  taught 
that  the  use  of  booze  is  bad  or  foolish,  then  the  mo- 


Substitutes  for  the  Saloon       263 

tion  picture  show  is  a  mighty  good  propaganda 
medium  for  the  anti-saloon  men. 

The  motion  picture  house  possesses  many  of  the 
virtues  of  the  saloon,  and  practically  none  of  its 
vices.  Here  is  found  the  free  normal  atmosphere  to 
which  the  average  man  is  accustomed.  Attentions 
are  not  forced  upon  him.  He  may  come  and  go  as 
he  pleases.  There's  no  one  at  the  door  to  bid  him 
an  embarrassing  welcome  or  speed  him  a  confusing 
farewell.  He  doesn't  have  to  talk  about  himself  and 
his  affairs,  nor  about  his  family.  The  average  work- 
ingman  is  about  as  shy  a  creature  out  of  his  natural 
element  as  one  can  find  anywhere.  In  the  motion 
picture  house  he  may  come  and  go  in  the  dark.  He 
isn't  compelled  to  wear  good  clothes^ — he  doesn't 
even  have  to  change  his  shirt  or  put  on  a  stiff  linen 
collar.  He  can  come  just  as  he  is.  To  the  average 
workingman  "dressing  up"  is  an  intolerable  burden. 
When  a  man  takes  the  little  ticket  that  is  flipped  at 
him  through  the  cleverly  contrived  machine  in  the 
selling  booth  in  front  of  the  picture  house  he  takes  it 
with  a  feeling  of  independence,  and  he  passes  into 
the  show  with  his  head  up. 

Furthermore,  he  can  take  his  wife  and  children. 
He  cannot  take  them  to  the  saloon.  The  working- 
man  can  afford  to  take  his  family  to  the  picture  show, 
because  it  usually  costs  him  no  more  than  if  he  spent 
the  evening  in  a  saloon.  And  he  feels  a  lot  better 
for  it  the  morning  after.  This  often  induces  him 
to  try  it  again.  A  few  such  experiences  and  the  en- 


264  Why  Prohibition! 

tire  family  are  regular  customers  at  the  motion  pic- 
ture house. 

Whereas  in  the  saloon  the  evening  is  usually  spent 
in  an  inane  or  worse  manner,  the  modern  motion  pic- 
ture show  has  in  it  a  distinct  educational  advantage, 
and  the  education  comes  in  a  form  which  is  palatable 
and  easily  digested.  The  mind  isn't  taxed  unduly. 
The  workingman  really  hasn't  much  mind  left  at  the 
end  of  an  average  day's  work.  Also,  popular  edu- 
cational films  are  interspersed  with  others  of  a 
dramatic  or  humorous  character.  Sometimes  the 
dramatic  picture  has  an  element  of  moral  or  ethical 
teaching  which  is  decidedly  wholesome.  The  inane 
harmful  film  is  rapidly  disappearing  even  from  the 
cheaper  houses.  The  entire  film  business  is  on  the 
up  grade.  Where  this  is  not  the  case,  it  usually 
happens  that  the  people  who  have  constructive  sug- 
gestions are  not  co-operating  with  the  picture  house 
manager.  It  is  surprising  how  readily  he  will  work 
with  an  intelligent,  broad-minded  group  of  persons 
who  have  taken  pains  to  study  the  motion  picture 
business  and  its  possibilities. 

To  what  extent  the  Church  or  the  school  may  en- 
gage in  the  motion  picture  business  depends  upon  the 
character  of  the  neighbourhood,  the  ability  to  prop- 
erly finance  such  an  enterprise,  the  opportunity  for 
making  a  selection  of  the  right  kind  of  films,  and 
some  other  questions  which  may  be  peculiar  to  the  lo- 
cality or  the  organisation  attempting  it.  But  prin- 
cipally, it  is  a  matter  of  conducting  the  enterprise  in  a 


Substitutes  for  the  Saloon       265 

business-like  manner,  for  running  a  motion  picture 
show  isn't  a  job  for  amateurs — it  requires  specialisa- 
tion and  experience,  which,  however,  may  be  ac- 
quired by  educational  and  religious  institutions  if 
brains  and  energy  are  put  into  the  task.  Chiefly, 
one  must  have  studied  the  element  of  human  nature. 

Ten  per  cent,  of  the  workingmen  in  large  cities 
eat  their  lunches  in  saloons,  according  to  the  study 
of  the  habits  of  life  of  one  thousand  workingmen 
already  referred  to.  It  would  be  a  great  advantage 
if  employers  of  labour  were  to  furnish  separate 
places  in  which  their  employes  might  eat  their 
luncheons,  but  of  all  those  involved  in  this  study  only 
1 6  per  cent,  replied  that  this  was  the  case  in  the 
shops  in  which  they  worked.  Hot  coffee,  or  milk,  or 
other  soft  drinks  might  be  served  with  advantage. 
There  should  be  absolute  freedom  from  paternalism, 
every  feature  of  the  enterprise  being  conducted  in  a 
democratic  spirit  and  as  nearly  as  possible  upon  a 
self-supporting  basis. 

Public  drinking  stands  or  fountains  should  be  pro- 
vided which  should  be  sanitary  in  every  particular, 
and  there  should  be  a  sufficient  number  to  supply  the 
needs  of  the  people,  especially  in  the  poorer  parts  of 
the  city — not  merely  in  parks  or  recreation  centres. 
The  expense  of  furnishing  these  fountains  is  com- 
paratively small.  In  this  connection  it  is  well  to 
remember  that  the  saloons  have  made  it  their  busi- 
ness to  furnish  drinking  troughs  for  horses,  and 
this  has  served  as  an  attraction  to  the  saloon  itself; 


266  Why  Prohibition! 

for  the  drivers  of  these  horses,  out  of  a  sense  of 
gratitude,  or  because  they  feel  impelled  to  do  so  for 
other  reasons,  enter  the  saloon  to  buy  drinks  for 
themselves.  This  arrangement  is  unsanitary  for  the 
horses,  for  they  are  just  as  liable  as  humans  to  suf- 
fer from  the  "common  drinking  cup" — but  facilities 
should  be  provided  for  furnishing  water  to  horses 
whose  drivers  have  their  own  drinking  pails. 

The  desire  for  sociability  which  is  often  satisfied 
in  the  saloon  is  a  legitimate  one,  and  it  must  be  reck- 
oned with  when  one  is  considering  substitutes.  In 
the  saloon  the  average  man  may  "shake  out  his 
heart."  Here  he  finds  a  freedom  which  makes  the 
saloon  peculiarly  attractive.  Workingmen  will  sit 
about  the  tables  and  for  hours  at  a  time  discuss  with 
perfect  freedom  the  questions  which  so  vitally  con- 
cern them. 

Saloons  that  contain  stalls  are  always  popular. 
Small  parties  of  men  sometimes  like  to  get  together 
in  private  conference  and  talk  over  personal  mat- 
ters. Perhaps  a  few  old-time  friends  have  just  met 
and  they  want  to  be  alone.  At  present  they  go  to 
the  saloon  for  this  conference,  and,  of  course,  they 
take  a  drink.  And  often  they  aren't  through  drink- 
ing until  each  man  in  the  party  treats  the  rest.  A 
saloon  substitute  might  well  be  equipped  with  such 
stalls  where  similar  conferences  may  be  held. 

Lounging  and  rest  rooms  are  a  very  essential  fea- 
ture of  a  saloon  substitute. 


Substitutes  for  the  Saloon       267 

Saloons  have  free  'phones.  This  should  also  be 
a  feature  of  the  saloon  substitute. 

At  present  there  are  very  few  places  where  men 
may  go  to  enjoy  the  privileges  of  the  shower  bath 
and  the  swimming  pool.  Men  do  not  naturally  pre- 
fer to  live  in  filth;  they  will  be  clean  if  they  are 
given  an  opportunity  to  do  so.  The  Y.  M.  C.  A. 
has  made  such  provision,  but  the  patrons  of  the 
saloon  and  the  Y.  M.  C.  A.  have  very  little  in  com- 
mon. 

The  open  forum  idea  should  be  developed.  For 
here  men  will  find  that  which  so  readily  appeals  to 
them — they  may  talk  back  at  the  speaker  and  ex- 
press their  own  convictions.  The  open  forum  prin- 
ciple is  really  developed  to  a  considerable  extent 
in  the  average  saloon,  for  here  workingmen  and 
others  find  an  opportunity  to  freely  express  them- 
selves. Properly  organised,  the  open  forum,  in  this 
respect  at  any  rate,  may  be  made  much  more  attrac- 
tive than  the  saloon,  for  the  discussion  is  more  in- 
telligent in  the  open  forum. 

"Labour  Temples"  have  become  exceedingly  popu- 
lar, especially  with  the  organised  workingmen.  In- 
toxicating liquor  is  rarely,  if  ever,  permitted  inside 
these  buildings.  These  practically  become  social 
centres  for  the  members  of  trade  unions  and  their 
families.  Not  only  does  one  find  the  regular  head- 
quarters of  the  union  in  these  buildings,  but  fre- 
quently special  social  affairs  are  conducted.  Lectures 
are  given  and  the  smaller  rooms  are  used  for  parties 


268  Why  Prohibition! 

of  various  kinds.  In  many  parts  of  this  country 
stock  companies  for  the  purpose  of  erecting  Labour 
Temples  have  been  organised,  and  it  is  suggested 
wherever  possible  that  those  interested  in  furnish- 
ing saloon  substitutes  for  workingmen  help  these  or- 
ganisations by  purchasing  stock,  thus  making  it  easier 
for  the  workers  to  realise  their  laudable  ambitions. 
In  most  cases  such  stock  will  provide  a  fairly  good 
financial  investment.  But  even  though  no  financial 
returns  are  received  it  would  be  a  good  investment 
anyway. 

Workingmen  also  frequently  organise  social  and 
athletic  clubs  of  their  own,  assuming  entire  respon- 
sibility for  their  management  and  support.  Such 
enterprises  should  not  only  be  heartily  encouraged, 
but,  whenever  the  opportunity  offers,  they  should  be 
made  more  easily  possible  for  the  workers  who  may 
not  have  a  sufficient  amount  of  money  to  conduct 
them  as  they  would  like,  their  personal  efforts  be- 
ing supplemented  by  those  interested  in  such  enter- 
prises. 

School-houses  belong  to  the  people.  They  have  a 
right  to  use  them,  in  spite  of  the  technicalities  upon 
which  trustees  and  other  governing  bodies  sometimes 
deny  their  use  to  the  masses.  School  buildings  may 
be  used  in  many  ways.  One  of  the  good  things  about 
them  is  that  their  use  appeals  to  the  entire  family. 
Indeed,  a  school-house  may  more  easily  become  the 
social  centre  for  the  community  than  any  other  estab- 
lished institution  which  one  may  find  in  the  ordinary 


Substitutes  for  the  Saloon       269 

city.  It  should  not  be  very  difficult  to  keep  the 
buildings  in  such  a  sanitary  condition  as  to  make 
them  usable  during  the  day  for  the  children,  and  for 
their  parents  during  the  evening.  In  many  cities 
evening  lecture  courses  are  provided  in  the  public 
schools.  These  are  of  a  popular  character,  and  ap- 
peal even  to  the  uneducated  among  working  people. 

In  most  cities  social  settlement  buildings  have  been 
established.  Ordinarily  they  are  conducted  upon  a 
thoroughly  democratic  basis.  The  rooms  of  the  set- 
tlement may  be  employed  for  clubs  composed  of  men 
or  women  in  the  neighbourhood. 

Many  churches  are  in  a  position  to  furnish  facil- 
ities which  may  answer  the  needs  we  are  considering. 
The  effectiveness  of  the  Church  as  a  saloon  substi- 
tute depends  largely  upon  its  location,  the  breadth  of 
view  of  those  in  authority,  and  its  freedom  from  sec- 
tarianism. Whether  the  Church  itself  may  serve 
as  a  social  centre  or  whether  it  might  be  better  to 
operate  through  an  outside  organisation,  must  be 
determined  by  each  Church  for  itself. 

One  of  the  best  methods  of  providing  saloon  sub- 
stitutes is  that  of  furnishing  a  general  social  centre 
which  will  provide  gymnasiums,  bowling  alleys,  card 
tables  and  games,  baths  and  swimming  pools  and 
halls  for  lecture  courses.  There  might  be  refresh- 
ment rooms,  lodge  and  club  rooms  which  may  be 
rented  at  a  nominal  cost.  It  is  true  that  under  or- 
dinary circumstances  such  substitutes  are  patronised 
chiefly  by  young  men  and  women,  and  in  but  a  few: 


270  Why  Prohibition  1 

cases  by  adult  artisans.  However,  they  do  serve  a 
good  purpose  to  this  extent. 

In  conducting  an  enterprise  of  this  kind  ample 
facilities  should  be  provided  for  women — especially 
of  the  industrial  class,  for  there  is  no  group  which 
needs  the  right  kind  of  a  social  centre  more  than 
working  women. 

And  if  there  were  more  recreational  centres  of  a 
wholesome  character  in  which  young  men  and  women 
might  together  enjoy  their  leisure  time — without  too 
many  artificial  restrictions  and  too  much  espionage — > 
a  real  need  would  be  met. 

When  a  social  centre  is  conducted  in  a  "down- 
town" district  or  in  some  other  section  of  the  city 
where  men  predominate — especially  men  who  are  in 
the  city  temporarily,  as  for  example,  sailors,  soldiers, 
farm  hands,  lumber-jacks  and  others  of  this  type.— * 
it  is  necessary  to  conduct  the  enterprise  in  a  manner 
peculiarly  adapted  to  meet  their  needs.  But  while  a 
vigorous  and  possibly  a  somewhat  noisy  programme 
may  be  essential  in  some  parts  of  the  building,  pro- 
vision should  be  made  for  games  and  other  features 
of  a  quieter  nature. 

Saloons  are  frequently  used  as  employment 
agencies  and  for  banking  purposes.  One  of  the  worst 
features  of  this  practice  is  that  the  temptation  to 
spend  wages  for  drink  is  almost  irresistible.  Here 
is  a  field  for  real  service  in  the  saloon  substitute. 

It  may  be  desirable  to  provide  dormitories  for 
men.  This  would  be  of  immense  advantage  to  large 


Substitute^  for  the  Saloon       271 

numbers  who,  especially  during  the  winter  season  in 
our  great  cities,  spend  the  nights  in  the  back  rooms 
of  saloons.  The  social  centre  may  during  the  year 
become  the  home  for  thousands  of  homeless  men 
who  now  spend  their  time  on  the  streets  or  in  the 
barroom,  because  there  is  no  other  place  to  which 
they  can  go. 

We  have  not  begun  to  appreciate  the  value  and 
attractiveness  of  the  drama  for  the  people.  Of 
course,  it  is  well  known  that  the  theatre  is  tremen- 
dously appealing,  but  there  are  great  possibilities  in 
this  field  to  depict  the  life  and  the  hopes  and  the 
aspirations  of  workingmen  which  have  not  yet 
seemed  to  grip  those  who  are  in  a  position  to  de- 
velop dramatics  among  the  working  classes.  With 
a  combination  of  semi-professional  and  amateur  per- 
formers gotten  together  for  the  presentation  of  plays 
of  various  kinds,  of  tableaux,  and  even  of  vaude- 
ville of  a.  high  order,  attractive  programmes  may  be 
worked  out  in  local  communities.  For  those  who 
have  talent  in  this  direction  there  is  abundant  op- 
portunity to  serve  the  people. 

Music  is  a  most  appealing  feature.  Why  may  not 
concert  halls  in  which  high-grade  music  is  regularly 
furnished  be  provided  as  a  saloon  substitute?  These 
concert  halls  should  be  placed  not  so  much  in  the 
so-called  "uptown"  districts,  but  in  great  halls  in  the 
centre  of  the  section  in  which  the  poorest  people 
live — i.  e.,  in  the  same  districts  which  were  pre- 
viously occupied  by  the  saloons.  Choral  unions  com- 


272  Why  Prohibition! 

posed  of  the  young  people  from  the  churches  or  any 
others  who  desire  to  learn  how  to  sing  may  become 
the  centre  about  which  such  concerts  might  be  or- 
ganised. Other  musical  organisations  will  readily 
suggest  themselves.  Wherever  it  is  not  possible  to 
organise  an  elaborate  musical  society  or  even  to  fur- 
nish an  orchestra  or  band,  one  may  still  rely  upon  a 
first-class  phonograph  or  even  an  orchestrion.  The 
phonograph  has  in  it  great  possibilities  for  furnish- 
ing high-grade  music.  A  pianola  may  also  be  em- 
ployed with  good  effect. 

During  the  summer  season  when  outdoor  recrea- 
tion is  required  public  parks  may  serve  as  saloon 
substitutes.  But  such  parks  should  contain  features 
which  will  make  them  the  actual  playgrounds  for 
the  people,  and  these  features  should  furnish  or- 
ganised amusement  for  adults  as  well  as  children. 
In  cities  which  are  located  on  water  fronts  recrea- 
tion piers  will  be  found  exceedingly  valuable. 

It  would  be  an  ideal  thing  if  the  average  saloon 
substitute  could  be  conducted  by  the  municipality  or 
the  State,  for  this  would  give  it  a  degree  of  perma- 
nence which  is  not  always  possible  when  it  is  de- 
pendent upon  private  philanthropy  for  its  mainte- 
nance— private  philanthropy  is  often  spasmodic. 
Furthermore,  when  the  city  conducts  such  an  enter- 
prise it  promptly  eliminates  the  element  of  patronage 
or  paternalism,  because  the  average  man  would  look 
upon  such  an  institution  in  the  same  way  in  which 
he  regards  the  public  school  which  his  children  at- 


Substitutes  for  the  Saloon       273 

tend.  He  feels  that  to  a  degree,  at  any  rate,  he  is  a 
taxpayer,  and  that  he,  himself,  is  helping  to  main- 
tain the  enterprise  in  whosebenefits  he  is  participating. 

However,  saloon  substitutes  or  social  centres  con- 
ducted by  interested  individuals  may  do  certain 
things  which  the  city's  "plant"  may  not  carry  out 
with  the  same  degree  of  freedom  and  adaptability. 
So  that  one  need  not  feel  discouraged  or  inclined  to 
dismiss  the  whole  matter  simply  because  the  city  is 
not  in  a  position  or  is  unwilling  to  undertake  the 
support  of  a  social  centre. 

It  is  important  that  the  enterprise,  whatever  it  may 
be,  should  not  be  called  a  "saloon  substitute."  The 
fact  that  one  is  trying  to  "reform"  somebody  through 
a  saloon  substitute  immediately  makes  the  "some- 
body" resent  the  implied  superiority.  Therefore, 
whatever  is  attempted  should  be  done  in  the  most 
natural  and  unobtrusive  fashion — that  is,  one  may 
give  the  enterprise  all  the  publicity  that  one  may  be 
able  to  secure  for  it,  but  the  publicity  should  be  given 
the  work  itself,  and  not  to  the  phrase,  "saloon  sub- 


stitute." 


At  the  risk  of  repetition  I  would  emphasise  two 
important  considerations : 

First,  is  the  necessity  of  making  the  work  as  self- 
supporting  as  possible.  The  average  American 
workingman  prefers  to  pay  his  way,  and  this  is  a 
spirit  which  should  be  encouraged  and  heartily  com- 
mended. True,  he  may  not  be  able  to  pay  his  just 
share  of  the  expense,  but  he  should  be  asked  to  pay 


274  LWhy  Prohibition! 

all  that  Tie  can  afford  for  his  own  sake,  as  well  as 
for  the  sake  of  securing  a  larger  measure  of  support 
for  the  enterprise  itself. 

Second,  it  is  highly  important  that  the  enterprise 
be  thoroughly  democratised.  Anything  that  is  man- 
aged purely  from  above  is  bound  to  fail  with  the 
average  man.  So  far  as  possible  plans  and  ideals 
should  be  permitted  to  emerge  from  the  people, 
themselves,  for,  after  all,  the  work  is  conducted  to 
supply  their  needs  and  to  satisfy  their  desires — not 
to  give  gratification  to  those  who  may  be  its  chief 
supporters  or  promoters.  There  must  not  be  too 
much  government,  too  much  discipline,  too  many 
rules  and  regulations  about  the  kind  of  an  enterprise 
that  we  are  discussing. 

It  has  been  said  that  married  men  spend  more 
time  in  the  saloon  than  single  men.  This  is  some- 
what startling,  because  married  life  is  supposed  to 
have  a  sobering  effect  upon  a  man.  Can  it  be  that 
in  many  of  these  cases  the  home  has  failed  to  func- 
tion? For  let  it  be  said  with  all  the  emphasis  pos- 
sible that  in  the  last  analysis  the  home  must  be  the 
best  substitute  for  the  saloon. 

It  is  very  generally  true  that  men  do  not  do  their 
part  in  making  the  home  what  it  should  be  from  the 
social  standpoint;  and  perhaps  too  much  has  been 
said  about  wives  failing  to  make  themselves  and 
their  homes  more  attractive,  thus  "driving  their  poor 
husbands  to  drink." 

Perhaps  no  satisfactory  solution  may  be  found  of 


Substitutes  for  the  Saloon       275 

this  particular  aspect  of  the  problem  until  in  some 
way  it  becomes  possible  to  provide  more  cheerful 
homes  for  working  people,  in  point  of  ventilation, 
light,  space  and  general  outlook.  This  condition 
must  be  met  by  men  and  women  of  large  social  con- 
ceptions. It  may  be  taken  up  by  the  municipality  or 
the  State — somebody  must  do  it,  for  it  is  unfair  and 
short-sighted  to  charge  up  to  married  men  and 
women  social  sins  and  omissions  for  which  they  are 
only  in  part  responsible. 

When  one  discusses  the  question  of  what  is  going 
to  happen  when  the  saloons  are  closed  it  is  exceed- 
ingly important  to  have  in  mind  the  causes  which 
impel  men  to  go  to  the  saloon,  outside  of  what  the 
saloon  itself  has  to  offer.  For  let  it  be  remembered 
there  are  other  social  evils  besides  the  saloon  in 
which  men  may  find  refuge  when  the  saloons  are 
closed,  unless  the  pressures  of  life  are  taken  off. 

Will  the  strain  of  the  day's  work  be  relieved  when 
the  saloons  are  put  out  of  business  ?  It  will,  for  some 
men,  undoubtedly.  Will  workingmen  have  better 
homes  to  go  to?  Many  will,  unquestionably.  But 
for  the  great  mass  of  men,  the  ordinary  men,  of 
whom  there  are  so  many,  these  blessings  may  be  a 
long  time  coming,  unless  society  or  the  State  as  a 
whole  sees  to  it  that  better  general  social  and 
economic  conditions  prevail.  The  strong,  indepen- 
dent workingman  will  fight  his  own  battles,  and  he 
will  carry  with  him  many  others  of  his  class,  but 
he  cannot  do  it  all — the  rest  of  us  must  help. 


XIII 
How  Prohibition  Works  in  Practice 

UNTIL  we  have  learned  to  reproduce  in  blue  prints 
and  statistics  human  joy  and  happiness,  it  will  be 
impossible  to  satisfactorily  tabulate  the  immediate 
and  the  permanent  effects  of  prohibition.  For  after 
all,  the  best  results  of  prohibition  come  in  terms  of 
the  mind  and  heart. 

But  one  will  never  need  to  be  a  sociologist  or  a 
psychologist  to  determine  for  himself  whether  or 
not  prohibition  is  a  good  thing  or  a  bad  thing  for  a 
community.  The  fruits  of  prohibition  are  too 
obvious. 

Liquor  men  have  been  saying  rather  persistently 
that  while  it  may  be  possible  to  vote  out  the  saloon, 
it  is  impossible  to  keep  out  booze — but  we  may  set 
it  down  for  a  fact  that  the  wettest  "dry"  State  is 
drier  than  the  driest  "wet"  State. 

If  liquor  is  sold  against  the  law  in  any  commun- 
ity, or  in  any  State,  the  liquor  men  are  responsible 
for  it  and  they  should  be  prosecuted  to  the  full  ex- 
tent of  the  law.  The  amazing  thing  is  that  they 
have  the  boldness  to  boast  of  their  lawlessness  and 

276 


How  Prohibition  Works        277 

with  unashamed  faces  to  declare  that  no  matter  what 
the  people  say,  they  will  continue  to  sell  liquor. 

But  does  prohibition  work  in  practice? 

Let  us  call  the  witnesses  who  know  the  facts. 

First  of  all,  let  us  call  the  liquor  men  themselves — 
and  they  can  speak  with  some  degree  of  authority. 

If  prohibition  is  not  effective,  then  why  is  it  that 
the  liquor  men  are  fighting  it  so  strenuously,  making 
every  sacrifice  in  order  to  keep  prohibition  out  of 
their  cities  and  states  and  out  of  the  constitutional 
law? 

Why  do  they  spend  immense  sums  of  money  to 
oppose  the  prohibitionists — if  it  does  not  affect  their 
business  very  materially? 

Why  is  it  that  liquor  men  are  rapidly  changing 
their  plans  so  that  instead  of  producing  ushoots  and 
booze/'  they  are  turning  out  boots  and  shoes? 

If  prohibition  isn't  effective  why  does  every  liquor 
journal  devote  most  of  its  space  to  a  discussion  of  the 
"menace  of  prohibition"? 

It's  because  the  liquor  men  know  that  prohibition 
prohibits. 

The  principal  of  a  commercial  high  school  in 
Brooklyn,  N.  Y.,  has  for  years  had  a  standing  offer 
that  if  any  man  will  name  any  one  of  the  two  thou- 
sand or  more  cities,  villages  or  towns  which  have  had 
their  saloons  out  five  years  or  more,  that  has  a  higher 
tax  rate  than  when  it  had  saloons,  or  than  any  neigh- 
bouring saloon  town  has,  other  things  being  equal,  he 


278  Why  Prohibition! 

would  pay  one  hundred  dollars  for  the  name  of  the 
town. 

He  also  declares  that  if  any  man  will  find  among 
these  towns  that  have  been  dry  for  five  years  or 
more  any  town  in  which  the  books  of  the  merchants 
in  reputable  businesses  such  as  groceries,  clothing 
stores,  shoe  stores,  real  estate,  manufacturing,  etc., 
do  not  show  that  they  are  doing  more  business  and 
better  business  than  when  they  had  saloons,  or  than 
any  neighbouring  saloon  towns,  other  things  being 
equal,  he  will  pay  one  hundred  dollars  cash  for  the 
name  of  the  town. 

Nobody  has  yet  taken  up  this  offer — it's  because 
prohibition  makes  good  in  practice. 

When  the  question  of  uNo-License"  was  being 
voted  upon  in  Boston,  Eugene  M.  Foss,  formerly 
Governor  of  Massachusetts,  printed  this  challenge 
in  the  Boston  daily  newspapers : 

"I  make  the  following  proposition  to  the  voters  in  Bos- 
ton :  'I  will  agree  to  see  the  city  of  Boston  harmless  so  far 
as  the  loss  of  revenue  from  liquor  licenses,  water  rents  and 
all  other  revenues  connected  with  the  saloon  business  of 
Boston  is  concerned,  provided  the  city  of  Boston  will  enter 
into  a  contract  with  me  for  a  term  of  five  years  to  give  me 
one-half  of  any  savings  that  the  city  may  make  directly 
or  indirectly,  on  account  of  the  city  going  "No-License." 
This  matter  to  be  referred  to  a  commission  of  three,  the 
Mayor  of  Boston  to  appoint  one,  I  to  appoint  one,  these 
two  to  choose  the  third  member.' 


How  Prohibition  Works        279 

"I  will  put  up  a  Bond  of  $1,000,000  to  protect  the  city 
in  this  agreement." 

But  the  challenge  was  not  accepted. 

Colorado  has  had  a  chance  to  try  out  prohibition 
and  here  is  the  testimony  of  leading  labour  men  re- 
garding the  results  so  far  as  they  affect  the  workers. 
Chester  J.  Common,  president  of  the  Building 
Trades  Council  of  Denver,  says: 

"I  am  frank  to  say  I  voted  against  the  prohibition  move- 
ment, thinking  it  would  hurt  business  in  a  general  way. 

"Organised  labour  in  Colorado  is  in  better  shape  than  it 
has  been  for  years.  Our  members  are  better  fed,  better 
clothed  and  have  more  money  in  the  banks  than  any  time 
since  I  have  been  in  Colorado — 14  years." 

William  C.  Thornton,  President  of  the  Denver 
Trades  and  Labour  Assembly,  also  states  that  he 
voted  against  prohibition. 

"I  venture  to  assert,"  says  Mr.  Thornton,  "outside  of  the 
old  saloon  interests,  you  couldn't  muster  a  corporal's  guard 
in  the  labour  movement  of  Denver  to-day,  who  would  say 
that  they  were  in  favour  of  the  return  of  the  saloon." 

The  strongest  endorsement  of  the  Prohibition  law 
in  Colorado  comes  from  Otto  F.  Thum,  the  first 
President  of  the  Colorado  Federation  of  Labor  and 
nationally  known  in  trade  union  circles. 

Mr.  Thum  says  that  prohibition  has  strengthened 


28o  Why  Prohibition! 

organised  labour  in  that  state,  and  that  it  is  in  better 
condition  to-day  than  ever  before. 

"Brewers  and  maltsters,"  writes  Mr.  Thum,  "have  suf- 
fered loss  in  their  trade,  but  the  other  departments  of  the 
brewery  workers  are  still  intact — bottlers,  drivers,  engine- 
men,  and  stablemen.  These  are  all  thriving. 

"But  to  the  surprise  of  all,  the  cigarmakers  have  more 
members  at  work  in  Denver  now  than  at  any  other  time. 
Barbers  have  more  members  employed  than  ever  before. 

"The  movies  are  the  greatest  beneficiaries,  and  we  have 
one  of  the  strongest  movie  operators'  unions  in  the  whole 
country.  The  musicians  feared  that  they  would  suffer  be- 
cause of  the  loss  of  the  cabaret.  But  they  are  more  than 
compensated  by  the  gain  in  the  movies,  where  they  are  much 
more  numerously  employed  under  vastly  better  conditions 
than  in  the  saloons.  The  milk  business  has  grown  beyond 
comprehension,  and  we  expect  to  organise  these  in  the  near 
future. 

"In  Denver  we  have  been  for  many  years  trying  to  get 
the  boys  to  build  a  Labour  Temple,  but  were  always  thrown 
down  by  a  sinister  influence — the  saloons.  We  have  108 
unions  in  Denver  and  they  meet  in  28  different  buildings. 
The  saloons  saw  to  it  that  we  were  not  bunched  in  a  Labour 
Temple.  But  now  that  we  are  well  rid  of  the  saloons  we  are 
able  to  get  together  and  in  a  very  short  time  we  will  have 
a  Labour  Temple  to  cost  about  $125,000." 

Mr.  Thum's  high  standing  in  the  American  la- 
bour movement  stamps  the  above  testimony  as  ab- 
solutely reliable.  Here  is  some  more  recent  testi- 
mony from  him: 


How  Prohibition  Works        281 

"Two  and  a  half  years  ago  Colorado  went  dry — our  State 
has  been  without  the  open  saloon  since  January  1,1916.  As 
in  every  other  state  where  the  temperance  people  are  trying 
to  oust  the  saloon  and  the  traffic  in  liquors,  the  wets  pre- 
dicted all  sorts  of  calamity  should  Colorado  close  up  the 
saloons.  Well,  we  did  close  them,  and  none  of  the  calami- 
ties nor  disasters  predicted  by  the  wets  have  materialised — 
on  the  contrary,  many  benefits  have  come  to  us. 

"Men  and  Labour — men  who  work  with  their  hands — 
have  been  benefited  in  a  hundred  different  ways,  but  more 
noticeably  and  chiefly  in  a  social  and  financial  way.  It  goes 
without  saying  that  a  sober  citizen  is  much  to  be  preferred 
to  a  more  or  less  dissolute  one,  but  we  here  in  Colorado  were 
really  not  prepared  for  such  a  wide  benefit  in  favour  of  so- 
briety as  has  come  to  us. 

"If  any  were  thrown  out  of  work  by  the  saloon  closing 
they  have  readily  found  other  employment  and  in  many  cases 
at  more  agreeable  occupations  and  at  better  pay. 

"Workmen  now  have  more  money  to  spend  in  the  legiti- 
mate lines  of  trade.  Our  workmen  are  healthier  now  than 
in  the  days  of  the  saloon.  People  who  go  without  drinks 
are  just  now  learning  how  to  eat.  Our  workers  will  never 
go  back  to  the  saloon  regime." 

Mr.  Clint  C.  Houston,  editor  of  the  Denver  La- 
bor  Bulletin,  wrote  as  follows: 

"I  have  received  many  letters  making  inquiries  in  relation 
to  the  effect  of  prohibition  upon  labour. 

"Labour  in  Colorado  is  at  least  50  per  cent,  better  off 
under  state-wide  prohibition  than  before. 

"The  people  of  Colorado  now  wonder  how  they  tolerated 


282  Why  Prohibition! 

saloons  as  long  as  they  did.  Many  of  those  who  were  most 
ardent  advocates  of  the  saloon,  for  the  reason  that  they 
thought  prohibition  would  ruin  business,  now  take  a  dif- 
ferent view  of  the  situation." 

And  here  is  some  testimony  from  Tom  J.  Greer, 
President  of  the  Louisiana  State  Federation  of  La- 
bor, as  to  how  prohibition  works: 

"Since  the  influence  of  the  liquor  traffic  has  been  removed 
from  union  politics  we  have  been  able  to  organise  successfully 
in  Shreveport. 

"The  following  facts  show  what  Shreveport  labour  has 
done  since  the  town  went  dry  in  1908: 

"Membership  in  trade  unions  has  increased  from  1,800 
to  3)700. 

"Home  owners  among  union  men  have  increased  forty  per 
cent,  since  Shreveport  went  dry. 

"In  that  town  of  20,000  white  people,  the  carpenters' 
union  has  increased  its  membership  from  65  to  375  (about 
600  per  cent.)  since  the  town  went  dry. 

"Painters,  when  Shreveport  was  wet,  had  35  members. 
To-day  the  painters'  union  has  145  members. 

"Barbers  have  shortened  their  hours  of  labour,  raised 
wages  continuously  and  have  a  100  per  cent,  organisation 
since  Shreveport  went  dry. 

"A  brewery  under  the  wet  regime  employed  six  non- 
union brewery  workers.  In  dry  Shreveport  this  brewery  has 
been  turned  into  an  ice  factory  which  employs  forty  union 
ice  makers. 

"The  wage  scale  in  Shreveport  compares  favourably  with 
any  city  in  the  country.  New  Orleans,  south  of  Shreve- 


How  Prohibition  Works        283 

port,  has  2,200  saloons  and  the  lowest  wage  scale  in  the 
country.  If  saloons  help  organised  labour  why  isn't  New 
Orleans  an  organised  town?" 

It  is  quite  a  remarkable  fact  that  the  leading  la- 
bour men  in  the  dry  states  are  strong  for  prohibi- 
tion, although  most  of  them  voted  for  the  saloon 
because  they  sincerely  believed  that  the  abolition  of 
the  liquor  traffic  would  create  a  labour  panic,  throw- 
ing many  unemployed  workingmen  onto  the  labour 
market. 

The  Building  Trades  Council  in  San  Francisco 
appointed  a  committee  to  investigate  prohibition's 
effect  in  dry  states.  This  committee  received  three 
letters  from  men  whom  they  trusted  which  were 
submitted  at  a  regular  meeting  of  the  Council. 

Here  are  the  letters: 

"I  have  been  a  drinking  man  and  voted  against  prohibi- 
tion, but  since  the  law  was  enacted  in  the  state  of  Washing- 
ton and  I  was  afforded  an  opportunity  to  observe  the  effects 
of  its  enforcement,  I  confess  that  the  membership  of  the 
Longshoremen's  Union  has  been  benefited  in  their  morale 
loo  per  cent." 

AUGUST  F.  SEITZ, 
Secretary  Tacoma  Longshoremen  s  Union. 

"I  believe  that  prohibition  has  come  to  stay  and  I  believe 
it  would  be  a  wise  thing  if  you,  representative  of  the  build- 
ing trades  of  this  city,  and  your  colleagues  and  the  National 


284  Why  Prohibition! 

Building  Trades  Council  would  take  the  advanced  step  for 
national  prohibition  which  I  believe  would  redound  to  the 
benefit  of  every  workingman  in  the  country." 

ALLISON  STOCKER, 
State  Treasurer  of  Colorado. 

"I  have  always  been  opposed  to  prohibition  on  the  ground 
that  such  legislation  interfered  with  personal  liberty,  and 
I  voted  against  the  measure  when  it  was  before  the  people 
for  adoption  two  years  ago.  I  am,  however,  constrained 
to  confess  that  my  observation  of  its  effects  has  been  such 
that  were  the  question  to  come  before  the  people  again  I 
would  change  my  vote  in  favour  of  having  the  law  retained, 
and  this  would  be  especially  for  the  reason  of  the  beneficial 
effects  that  it  has  had  upon  our  labouring  people  generally." 

EDWARD  W.  OLSEN, 
Chairman  Industrial  Insurance  De- 
partment and  former  State  Labour 
Commissioner  of  Washington. 

One  way  to  get  at  the  effects  of  prohibitiorii — in  so 
far  as  this  is  possible — is  to  take  the  two  states  which 
are  most  widely  known  as  prohibition  states,  Kansas 
and  Maine,  and  compare  them  with  a  typical  wet 
state,  New  Jersey,  the  latter  having  about  the  same 
population  as  Kansas  and  Maine  combined. 

Comparing  some  of  the  elements  of  life  which  in- 
dicate prosperity  or  which  at  least  show  high  ideals 
among  the  people,  we  find  the  following  in  the  states 
mentioned: 


How  Prohibition  Works        285 


Year 


New 
Jersey 


Kansas 

and 
Maine 


Population    (U.    S.    Census   Bureau 

estimate)  1915  2,881,000  2,574,000 

Internal  revenue  taxes  on  liquor 

and  tobacco 1917  $13,910,000  $751,915 

Assessed  value  property  per  capita..  1915  $861  $1,287 

Families  owning  homes  (U.  S.  Census 

Bureau)  1910  34%  60% 

Automobiles  ("The  Automobile") . . .  1916  75>42O  113,250 

Common  schools,  attendance  (U.  S. 

Bureau  of  Education) I9J7  421,000  427,000 

High  schools,  students  (U.  S.  Bureau 

of  Education) 1917  52,366  59,579 

College  and  normal  schools,  students 

(U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education) 1917  5,227  16,359 

Illiterate  persons  ten  years  of  age 

and  over 1910  113,502  53,522 

Illiterate  males  of  voting  age 1910  51,086  27,786 

Insane,  epileptics  and  inebriates  in 

institutions  (National  Committee  on 

Mental  Hygiene) *917  7)S12  4*650 

Prison  and  jail  population  (author- 
ity wardens) 1918  3,365  i,534 

Eleven  hundred  and  seventy-three  (1,173)  convicts  on  parole  from  New  Jersey  State 
Prison  March  23,  1918,  not  included  in  New  Jersey  total.  United  States  Government 
prisoners  not  included. 

How  does  prohibition  work  in  Canada?  B.  H. 
Spence  of  the  Dominion  Alliance  made  a  comprehen- 
sive study  of  the  conditions  existing  after  prohibi- 
tion had  been  tried  out  for  a  year,  and  here  are 
some  of  the  comments  received  from  responsible 
leaders  throughout  the  Dominion : 

"Retail  and  wholesale  business  increased  and  improved; 
a  larger  proportion  of  cash  trade;  a  greater  demand  for  the 
better  class  of  goods." 

"Increased  regularity,  punctuality,  and  efficiency  of  work- 


286  Why  Prohibition! 

ers,  resulting  in  greater  earnings  for  labour  and  larger  re- 
turns for  capital." 

"More  employment  at  better  wages;  better  conditions  and 
greater  safety  of  work;  higher  standard  of  living." 

"Rents  and  taxes  more  promptly  paid,  artisans  building 
and  buying  homes  for  themselves." 

"Home  life  bettered;  wages  formerly  wasted  now  used 
for  family  comforts  and  luxuries." 

"Savings  bank  deposits  increased;  money  diverted  from 
bar  and  liquor  shop  to  channels  of  honourable  trade,  giving 
health,  strength,  and  vitality  to  business  generally." 

"Hotel  accommodations  improved — now  quieter,  cleaner, 
safer,  and  more  homelike." 

"Schools  and  colleges  better  attended;  improvement  in 
health  and  morale  of  pupils;  better  results  from  work  of 
teachers." 

"Decrease  in  drunkenness  and  crime;  fewer  police  cases; 
ability  to  apply  prison  reform  methods  more  successfully." 

"Poverty  and  pauperism  lessened;  ignorance  and  vice  di- 
minished ;  social  reform  work  of  all  kinds  helped  and  made 
effective." 

"Many  former  opponents  of  prohibition  have  been  con- 
verted to  the  support  of  that  measure  by  the  operation  of 
the  law,  and  public  opinion  is  to-day  pronounced  in  favour 
of  this  method  of  dealing  with  the  evil  of  intemperance  than 
when  the  various  laws  were  enacted." 

"Prohibition  has  come  to  stay  in  Canada,  not  as  a  war 
measure,  but  as  a  permanent  legislative  reform." 


How  Prohibition  Works        287 

Following  are  some  opinions  of  Premiers: 

Nova  Scotia — "Regard  prohibitive  legislation  in  Nova 
Scotia  as  very  beneficial." 

(Sir)  G.  H.  MURRAY. 

Manitoba — "Results  are  certainly  beneficial,  and  the  act 
working  better  than  I  ever  expected." 

(Hon.)  T.  C.  NORRIS. 

Saskatchewan — "Crime  has  decreased,  and  one  of  our 
gaols  has  been  closed.  Money  formerly  spent  on  liquor  now 
finds  its  way  into  more  legitimate  channels,  and  the  pros- 
perity of  the  Province  as  a  whole  has  been  increased." 

(Hon.)  W.  M.  MARTIN. 

Ontario — "We  have  now  had  twelve  months'  experience 
of  the  Ontario  Temperance  Act,  and  I  am  thankful  to  be 
able  to  say  that  the  operation  of  the  law  has  come  up  to  my 
greatest  expectations.  .  .  .  Employers  of  labour  are  unani- 
mously of  opinion  that  our  people  are  doing  more  work  and 
better  work  than  ever  before. 

"A  patriotic  purpose  of  the  highest  order  has  been  served 
.  .  .  Official  figures  indicate  a  large  decrease  in  the  number 
of  convictions  for  drunkenness.  The  Act  has  been  instru- 
mental in  adding  greatly  to  the  comfort  and  happiness  of 
thousands  of  our  people." 

(Sir)  WILLIAM  HEARST. 

The  Manitoba  Government  has  published  figures 
showing  a  reduction  in  drunkenness  of  80  per  cent., 
of  all  crime  of  58  per  cent.  In  the  city  of  Winnipeg, 
during  the  last  three  months  of  License  the  police 
arrested  813  "drunks, "  in  the  first  three  months  of 


288  Why  Prohibition! 

prohibition  only  161.  In  Brandon,  Fair  Week  un- 
der License  showed  71  cases  of  drunkenness,  under 
prohibition  five. 

A  questionnaire  was  sent  to  the  Mayors  of  the 
principal  cities  and  towns  of  the  Province  of  Ontario 
asking  for  an  opinion  of  the  effect  of  the  first  year 
of  Prohibition.  Sixty-nine  telegraphic  replies  were 
received:  fifty-nine  were  decidedly  favourable,  nine 
non-committal,  and  one  unfavourable. 

Toronto  is  a  metropolitan  city  of  nearly  500,000 
people.  Letters  were  sent  to  members  of  the  To- 
ronto Board  of  Trade  asking  them  to  give  their 
frank  opinion  as  to  the  working  of  prohibition  in 
Toronto  and  its  effect,  beneficial  or  otherwise,  par- 
ticularly with  regard  to  business  conditions.  Over 
four  hundred  replies  were  received  within  a  few 
days  covering  practically  every  line  of  business,  and 
from  the  most  influential  firms  doing  business  in  the 
"Queen  City"  of  Canada.  The  replies  received  to 
this  inquiry  represent  the  verdict  of  the  Toronto 
business  world,  not  in  regard  to  the  theory  of  pro- 
hibition, but  the  actual  working  of  the  law  after  one 
year's  experience. 

Out  of  the  four  hundred  replies  received  only  nine 
expressed  unfavourable  opinions. 

Mr.  Spence  declares: 

"No  amount  of  sophistry,  academic  arguing,  specious  rea- 
soning, appeal  to  prejudice,  or  calumniation  of  opponents 
can  offset  the  cold,  hard  facts  herein  set  out.  Through  all 


How  Prohibition  Works        289 

the  dust  of  discussion  as  to  principles,  controversy  as  to 
methods,  the  distorted  imaginings  of  possible  cataclysmic 
social  results,  this  great  fact  stands  out  boldly — Prohibition 
Works.  Call  it  a  fool  method  if  you  will.  It  gets  results. 
Pipe  about  its  impracticability.  It  pays  financially,  socially, 
politically,  morally.  When  tried,  it  pleases,  it  makes  friends 
by  its  operation.  In  a  word  Prohibition  makes  good." 

James  Simpson  is  Vice-President  of  the  Canadian 
Trades  and  Labor  Congress  and  one  of  the  most 
influential  labour  men  in  America. 

Here  is  his  opinion  regarding  the  operation  of 
prohibition  in  Canada : 

"Convinced  by  the  logic  of  results  following  the  enactment 
and  enforcement  of  Prohibition  Laws,  the  working  men  of 
Canada  are  voting  the  liquor  traffic  out  of  existence.  La- 
bour sees  the  following  practical  results  following  the  adop- 
tion of  Prohibition  legislation: 

1.  The  increased  sobriety  of  the  people. 

2.  The  increased  efficiency  of  the  workers  as  employees, 
and  their  increased  effectiveness  in  dealing  with  their  own 
problems. 

3.  Improvement  in  the  payment  of  Union  dues. 

4.  A  substantial  increase  in  the  reserves  of  fuel  and  food 
in  thousands  of  working  men's  homes. 

5.  Conversion  of  the  use  of  property  from  the  production 
and  distribution  of  life-destroying  beverages  to  the  produc- 
tion and  distribution  of  useful  and  necessary  commodities. 

6.  The  improvement  of  hotel  accommodation  for  the  trav- 
elling public. 


290  Why  Prohibition! 

7.  The  restoration  of  despondent  and  discouraged  men  to 
positions  of  usefulness  and  responsibility  with  the  labour 
movement. 

8.  The  complete  destruction  of  the  argument  that  'the 
closing  of   licensed   places   reduces  standards  of  wages   in 
exact  ratio  to  the  amount  of  money  withheld  from  the  sellers 
of  liquor/ 

9.  The  insistence  of  men  for  higher  standards  of  living 
as  they  enjoy  the  benefits  of  total  abstinence. 

10.  More  co-operation  between  members  of  labour  or- 
ganisations when  industrial  unrest  develops  as  the  result  of 
an  unjust  economic  order. 

11.  The  effecting  of  economies  in  the  administration  of 
the  people's  affairs. 

12.  A  reduction  in  the  number  of  violations  of  civil  and 
criminal  laws,  and  in  the  number  of  cases  of  insanity. 

13.  An  improvement  in  the  environment  of  children,  and 
consequent   improvement   of   their   intellectual,    social   and 
moral  condition. 

14.  The  elimination  of  that  degrading  type  of  poverty 
which  is  the  result  of  an  unjust  economic  order,  plus  the 
result  of  the  expenditure  of  money  on  beverages  which  con- 
tain a  small  number  of  units  of  food  energy  and  a  large 
amount  of  alcohol,  which  is  destructive  of  life's  physical 
setting. 

15.  Increased  felicity  in  the  home,  and  greater  co-ordina- 
tion of  effort  looking  to  the  improvement  of  family  life." 

It's  the  same  story  everywhere — in  the  United 
States,  in  Canada,  in  England,  in  Russia — facts  and 
statistics  could  be  stacked  up  to  convince  any  open- 
minded  person  that  prohibition  works  in  practice. 


How  Prohibition  Works        291 

When  Michigan  was  about  to  vote  on  the  liquor 
question  the  Grand  Rapids  Press  wanted  to  find  out 
how  the  abolition  of  the  saloon  affected  commerce 
and  industry  in  Colorado,  so  they  sent  one  of  the 
cleverest  men  on  their  staff  to  make  an  impartial 
investigation.  He  wrote  a  series  of  articles  for  the 
Press  which  made  a  clear  case  for  the  opponents  of 
the  saloon. 

Major  C.  B.  Blethen,  editor  of  the  Seattle  Times, 
gave  out  an  interview  one  month  after  prohibition 
was  in  force  in  the  State  of  Washington. 

Here's  what  he  said: 

"My  paper  fought  against  prohibition.  We  fought  it 
on  economic  facts  alone.  We  believed  that  in  a  great  sea- 
port city  with  a  population  of  upwards  of  330,000,  prohibi- 
tion would  be  destructive;  it  would  bring  on  economic  dis- 
aster. We  believed  that  under  our  system  of  licensing  sa- 
loons we  had  the  liquor  traffic  about  as  well  controlled  as 
it  could  be,  and  we  wanted  to  let  it  alone,  and  so  we  fought 
as  hard  as  we  could  fight.  But  in  spite  of  all  we  could  do 
against  it,  prohibition  carried  and  it  went  into  effect  in 
Washington  January  i.  We  have  had  a  month  of  it  now. 

"And  how  has  it  worked  out? 

"We  already  know  that  it  is  a  great  benefit  morally  and 
from  an  economic  standpoint,  its  moral  benefit  has  been  tre- 
mendous. Seattle  had  336  saloons  and  we  had  about  1,600 
arrests  a  month  for  crimes  and  misdemeanors  growing  out 
of  liquor  drinking.  In  January  we  had  only  765  arrests 
and  sixty  of  those  were  made  January  i,  and  were  the  re- 
sult of  'hang-overs'  from  the  old  year.  The  previous  year 
there  were  2,600  arrests  in  the  same  month.  That  in  itself 


292  Why  Prohibition! 

is  enough  to  convince  any  man  with  a  conscience  that  pro- 
hibition is  necessary.  There  can  be  no  true  economy  in  any- 
thing that  is  immoral. 

"And  on  top  of  that  great  moral  result,  we  have  these 
economic  facts:  In  the  first  three  weeks  of  January  the 
savings  accounts  in  the  banks  of  Seattle  increased  greatly 
in  numbers.  There  was  not  a  grocery  store  in  Seattle  that 
did  not  show  an  increase  of  business  in  January  greater 
than  ever  known  in  any  month  before  in  all  the  history  of 
the  city,  except  in  holiday  time.  In  all  the  large  grocery 
stores  the  increase  was  immense.  In  addition  to  this  every 
dry  goods  store  in  Seattle,  except  one,  and  that  one  I  have 
no  figures  from,  had  a  wonderful  increase  in  business.  Each 
store  reported  the  largest  business  ever  done  in  one  month 
except  in  holiday  time. 

"I  wished  to  know  in  what  class  of  goods  the  sales  in- 
creased so  greatly  and  so  I  sent  to  all  the  grocery  and  dry 
goods  stores  to  find  that  out.  And  to  me  it  is  a  pitiful  thing, 
and  it  makes  me  sorry  that  we  did  not  have  prohibition 
long  ago — that  the  increase  in  sales  in  all  the  dry  goods 
stores  was  in  wearing  apparel  of  women  and  children,  and 
in  the  grocery  stores  the  increase  was  made  up  chiefly  of 
fruits  and  fancy  groceries.  This  proves  that  it  is  the  women 
and  children  who  suffer  most  from  the  liquor  business,  and 
it  is  the  women  and  children  who  benefit  greatest  from  pro- 
hibition. Money  that  went  formerly  over  the  bar  for 
whiskey  is  now  being  spent  for  clothing  for  the  women  and 
children,  and  in  better  food  for  the  household. 

"It  is  just  like  this:  When  you  close  the  saloons  the 
money  that  formerly  was  spent  there  remains  in  the  family 
of  the  wage  earner,  and  his  wife  and  children  buy  shoes 
and  clothing  and  better  food  with  it.  Yes,  sir,  we  have 


How  Prohibition  Works        293 

found  in  Seattle  that  it  is  better  to  buy  shoes  than  booze. 
The  families  of  wage-earners  in  Seattle  are  going  to  have 
more  food  and  clothes  and  everything  else  than  they  had 
before." 

Real  estate  men  and  bankers  are  keen  judges  of 
values  and  business  tendencies  and  prospects.  Here 
are  some  responses  from  responsible  men  in  the  cit- 
ies named,  as  to  how  prohibition  has  affected  them. 
They  are  given  merely  as  samples  from  typical 
cities.  Hundreds  of  others  might  easily  be  added : 

Birmingham,  Ala.  "The  law  is  actually  in  operation  at 
present  and  appears  to  be  one  of  the  most  complete  laws 
of  its  kind.  Its  effect  upon  rents  and  property  values  has 
been  nil  in  the  business  centre.  The  buildings  formerly 
occupied  by  saloons  have  been  rented  readily,  and,  as 
far  as  I  can  ascertain  at  the  moment,  at  the  same  rental 
rates.  The  abolition  of  the  saloon  has  had  a  beneficial 
effect  upon  values  in  the  business  centres.  Several  of  the 
buildings  formerly  occupied  by  saloons  in  the  outlying  sec- 
tions are  still  vacant,  but  the  general  effect  has  been  bene- 
ficial." 

Portland,  Oregon.  "An  element  which  enters  into  the 
situation  with  reference  to  the  effect  upon  land  values, 
is  that  it  has  come  to  be  an  accepted  fact  that  locations  for 
retail  liquor  establishments  must  bring  a  substantially 
higher  figure  than  if  leased  for  other  purposes.  That  is 
taken  into  consideration  in  estimating  value  from  the  in- 
come of  property,  the  higher  revenue  being  discounted  be- 
cause the  property  would  not  rent  for  the  equal  amount  if 
used  for  any  other  purposes;  that  the  use  for  this  purpose 


294  Why  Prohibition! 

is  more  or  less  temporary  and  not  to  be  depended  upon  and 
as  a  great  many  people  who  become  purchasers  would  not 
consent  to  the  use  of  property  for  saloons  or  liquor  stores. 
In  other  words  the  increased  revenue  because  of  this  sort 
of  occupancy  has  been  considered  rather  as  a  premium  upon 
undesirable  occupancy  than  as  indicating  what  the  permanent 
normal  rent  of  the  property  might  be  expected  to  be  and 
estimating  the  value  from  that." 

Wichita,  Kansas.  "Kansas  has  had  on  its  books  a  prohi- 
bition law  for  the  past  thirty  years  or  more,  but  the 
same  was  not  rigidly  enforced  in  Wichita  until  several  years 
ago  when  it  was  made  an  issue  in  one  of  the  campaigns  and 
a  dry  ticket  elected.  About  thirty  so-called  saloons  on  Doug- 
las Avenue  and  Main  Street  went  out  of  business  in  one 
day  leaving  that  many-'  vacant  buildings.  It  may  be  of  in- 
terest for  you  to  know  that  it  did  not  lower  the  rents;  that 
the  business  of  the  city  was  not  affected  thereby  and  that 
after  the  law  had  been  in  force  for  one  year,  a  canvass  of 
one  hundred  leading  business  men  and  merchants  of  the  city 
had  been  made  by  the  daily  paper,  which  formerly  supported 
the  wet  element,  out  of  which  ninety-seven  expressed  them- 
selves as  favourable  to  the  prohibitory  law,  claiming  that 
their  business  had  profited  thereby.  The  greatest  growth 
and  development  in  the  city  has  taken  place  since  the  law 
was  rigidly  enforced." 

Kansas  City,  Kansas.  "Increased  population,  more  build- 
ings, rent  doubled  in  residence  districts,  doubled  in  three 
years  in  business  districts.  Great  demands  for  small  homes 
to  be  built  for  workingmen.  Little  or  no  vacant  property 
and  when  it  was  vacant  was  in  that  state  due  to  condition 
of  the  property.  209.7  Per  cent,  increase  in  new  buildings. 


How  Prohibition  Works        295 

Three  times  as  many  labouring  men  bought  homes.  Police 
force  reduced  from  84  to  50  first  year.  Time  of  court  was 
frequently  six  and  eight  weeks  long  before;  it  did  not  last 
over  three  weeks  to  try  criminals.  One  time  the  judge  had 
no  criminals  to  try." 

Spokane,  Wash.  "From  January  first  to  May  first,  1915, 
this  city  arrested  501  drunks,  441  vagrants  and  250  disor- 
derlies. From  January  to  May  first,  1916,  the  record  was 
159  drunks,  128  vagrants,  89  disorderlies.  One  year  ago 
there  were  130  prisoners  in  the  county  jail,  now  there  are 
thirty." 

Denver,  Colo.  "Retail  stores  report  collections  as  break- 
ing all  previous  records.  Hundred  of  long  overdue  accounts 
considered  no  good  have  been  paid  up  since  the  state  became 
dry.  The  Denver  dry  goods  stores  report  shipping  more 
goods  to  out  of  town  customers  during  one  week  in  January, 
1916,  than  during  the  week  preceding  Christmas." 

Phoenix,  Arizona.  "Savings  bank  deposits  have  been  ma- 
terially increased  since  January  first,  1915.  As  a  concrete 
example  of  this  take  our  own  bank :  Our  total  deposits  from 
December  3ist,  1914,  was  $616,970.52.  Prohibition  became 
effective  January  ist,  1915,  and  on  February  ist  our  deposits 
were  $665,314.67.  On  March  ist,  $676,242.38,  and  on 
April  ist,  $681,754.38,  a  steady  monthly  increase.  On  De- 
cember 3 ist,  1915,  our  deposits  have  reached  $844,748.76, 
and  on  July  ist,  1916,  $1,122,870.22,  an  increase  of  $505,- 
899.69  in  one  year  and  seven  months  of  prohibition.  These 
are  actual  figures  taken  from  our  daily  statement  books." 

A  letter  from  an  important  and  well-known  mer- 
chant in  Seattle  reveals  an  interesting  situation : 


296  Why  Prohibition! 

"We  are  in  the  credit  clothing  business,  and  any  drain  on 
the  savings  or  earnings  of  the  wage-earners  is  felt  indirectly 
by  us.  When  money  is  plentiful  with  them  our  cash  receipts 
are  correspondingly  larger.  In  four  months  after  prohibition 
became  effective  our  records  showed  a  10  per  cent,  increase 
in  receipts.  The  significance  of  this  is  that  this  increase  was 
shown  the  first  week  in  January  and  has  been  steadily  upheld 
every  week  since. 

"Another  potent  fact  is  collections  on  delinquent  accounts 
have  increased  100  per  cent,  since  January  ist,  not  because 
we  have  a  more  efficient  collection  force,  for  our  collectors 
are  the  same  to  a  man.  Not  because  delinquents  have  been 
gone  after  with  greater  persistence,  as  the  same  effort  was 
put  forth  previously  as  now.  The  answer  is  obvious,  the 
people  have  more  money. 

"Our  experience  since  Seattle  has  been  dry  proves  con- 
clusively to  us  that  the  masses  of  the  people  have  more 
money,  more  of  the  necessities  of  life  and  are  consequently 
much  happier." 


It  is  quite  true  that  the  marked  results  noted  in 
these  letters  and  in  reports  from  dry  cities  and  towns 
are  not  altogether  due  to  prohibition.  But  if  pro- 
hibition had  come  in  during  a  period  of  industrial 
depression,  no  matter  what  the  immediate  cause 
may  have  been,  the  liquor  men  would  have  charged 
up  to  prohibition  all  the  evils  which  came  as  the  re- 
sult of  some  other  cause. 

But  these  men  who  are  on  the  ground,  whose  tes- 
timony we  have  just  read,  should  be  fairly  good 
judges  as  to  whether  prohibition  has  done  more  harm 


How  Prohibition  Works        297 


than  good.     Their  testimony  records  the  fact  that 
prohibition  is  a  good  thing  for  a  city. 

Here  and  there  you  will  find  a  man  who  will  tell 
you  that  the  use  of  liquor  or  the  saloon  as  an  insti- 
tution does  some  good — but  we  do  not  settle  any 
other  question  upon  this  basis.  We  have  a  right 
to  ask,  "Does  the  saloon  and  the  use  of  liquor  do 
more  harm  than  good?" — and  if  they  do,  then  we 
are  justified  in  abolishing  them. 


XIV 
How  to  Fight  the  Saloon 

THIS  isn't  a  chapter  for  seasoned  saloon- fighters 
• — the  old  campaigners  who  know  all  the  stunts  and 
strategies  for  putting  booze  to  flight. 

Nor  is  it  a  presentation  of  detailed  methods — 
it's  just  a  simple  discussion  for  the  benefit  of  the 
average  person  who  wants  to  help. 

I  want  to  say  a  last  word  to  these,  for  it  will  be 
their  spirit  and  their  attitude  which  will  determine 
the  future  of  the  problems  we  have  been  discussing. 

First  of  all,  let  me  tell  about  a  recent  experience : 

It  was  early  Sunday  evening,  shortly  before 
Church  time. 

Down  the  street  I  saw  a  bunch  of  regular  boys, 
from  10  to  14  years  old — about  a  dozen  of  them. 
They  were  not  particularly  noisy — just  lively. 

I  saw  them  approach  a  "mission."  I  heard  one 
of  them  whisper:  "They'll  give  us  a  book — they'll 
give  us  a  book!" 

The  boys  pushed  into  the  front  door — the  meet- 
ing hadn't  begun — when  the  person  in  charge  roughly 
ordered  them  out.  Queer,  too,  because  the  mission 
evidently  had  a  pretty  good  reputation  with  the  boys. 

298 


How  to  Fight  the  Saloon       299 

Somebody  in  the  mission  had  apparently  made  a  good 
impression  upon  them.  Too  bad  that  the  mission 
didn't  make  good  with  the  boys  that  Sunday  night. 

A  few  minutes  later  I  saw  them  on  the  avenue. 
A  policeman  was  in  their  midst. 

"You  kids  better  keep  off  Jane  Street,  or  I'll  lock 
you  up,"  he  was  saying  to  them.  Jane  Street  was 
on  that  policeman's  beat,  and  he  was  not  going  to 
have  any  trouble  with  anybody  if  he  could  help  it — 
especially  with  boys. 

The  ferocious  way  in  which  he  glared  at  them 
was  calculated  not  only  to  keep  them  off  the  po- 
liceman's beat,  but  if  the  cop  had  his  way  it  would 
have  kept  them  off  the  earth. 

The  boys  solemnly  declared  that  they  would  keep 
off  Jane  Street. 

Perhaps  ten  minutes  later  they  were  hanging 
around  some  car  barns  jollying  the  caretaker  in  the 
little  house  just  outside.  They  paraded  about  the 
car  barns  without  doing  any  mischief,  and  then  they 
came  to  the  corner  on  which  I  was  standing  watch- 
ing them. 

"Nothing  doing  anywhere,"  the  leader  said  to  me 
when  I  asked  them  why  they  were  not  doing  some- 
thing worth  while.  And  the  whole  bunch  crowded 
about  me,  all  talking  at  the  same  time,  because  I 
appeared  to  be  interested  in  them. 

They  expected  to  go  to  the  motion  picture  show 
that  night,  but  the  Mayor  had  ordered  the  picture 
show  closed. 


300  Why  Prohibition! 

Everything  else  was  closed,  too. 

The  police  station  was  open — I  saw  the  green 
lights  as  I  passed  it  going  to  my  lecture  appointment 
that  night,  and  probably  some  of  these  youngsters 
will  find  it  ere  long. 

"Nothing  doing  anywhere."  It  is  a  good  thing 
to  talk  about  closing  up  the  places  which  are  bad 
in  their  influence,  but  is  it  not  also  a  sensible  thing 
to  work  for  the  opening  up  of  places  which  are  good 
in  their  influence?  It's  much  harder  to  open  up 
good  places  than  it  is  to  close  down  bad  ones,  but 
the  job  is  worth  while. 

Crime  is  play  to  hosts  of  city  children  because  for 
many  years  play  was  counted  crime,  according  to  the 
city  ordinances. 

Statistics  indicate  that  crime  is  increasing  in  this 
country,  and  that  juvenile  crime  is  increasing  more 
rapidly  than  adult  crime.  This  does  not  mean  that 
children  are  actually  becoming  more  lawless  in  spirit 
nor  more  immoral  by  nature.  It  means  simply  that 
in  our  great  cities  we  have  been  adding  to  the  list 
of  crimes  or  misdemeanours  acts  which  in  the  open 
country  or  small  town  are  altogether  legitimate. 

Baseball,  bonfires,  shouting,  snowballing,  throw- 
ing stones — these  are  usually  permitted  in  the  coun- 
try, but  most  children  who  are  arrested  in  the  city 
are  "guilty"  of  these  or  somewhat  similar  acts,  for 
which  they  are  arrested. 

The  inevitable  result  of  the  attitude  of  the  courts 
toward  offending  children  makes  these  children  care- 


How  to  Fight  the  Saloon       301 

less  regarding  more  serious  crime.  The  conscious- 
ness that  they  are  doing  wrong  when  playing  base- 
ball soon  makes  them  indifferent  to  the  crime  of 
stealing  apples  from  the  Italian  fruit-seller's  stand. 

Probably  90  per  cent,  of  the  children  in  our  cities 
depend  upon  the  streets  'for  their  playground,  and, 
usually,  street-play  is  unorganised  and,  therefore, 
often  unprofitable. 

When  children  become  too  old  to  play  upon  the 
streets,  they  naturally  drift  into  the  saloon.  It  is 
almost  inevitable  that  they  should  do  so.  Where 
else  would  they  go  in  the  average  city?  Their  famil- 
iarity with  the  saloon  is  a  part  of  their  street-play 
training.  And  they  often  carry  into  the  saloon  the 
disregard  for  law  acquired  in  the  streets.  Is  it  any 
wonder  that  many  of  them  develop  into  pickpockets 
and  thugs  and  gunmen? 

But  the  time  to  begin  work  with  the  city  children 
is  when  they  naturally  seek  recreation  and  play. 
Those  who  would  decrease  crime  and  saloon  lawless- 
ness might  well  give  serious  thought  to  establishing 
and  maintaining  playgrounds  and  social  centres  for 
both  children  and  adults. 

"The  people  don't  want  decent  government,  and 
they  will  not  support  men  and  measures  that  have 
a  fine  idealism  back  of  them,"  is  the  snap  judgment 
of  the  average  saloon  fighter  when,  year  after  year, 
the  wets  win  out  in  his  town. 

It's  true  that  the  people  do  not  want  to  be  re- 
formed. It's  quite  evident  that  high-brow  views  of 


302  Why  Prohibition! 

civics  do  not  get  across.  It's  only  too  apparent  that 
"lofty  stuff"  makes  small  appeal  to  lowly  workers. 

The  reason  that  corrupt  politicians  are  lauded  and 
supported  by  the  people  is  because  they  are  so  hu- 
man, not  because  they  are  so  corrupt.  Their  cor- 
ruption is  the  weakest  part  of  their  appeal.  They 
make  good  with  the  masses  in  spite  of  it. 

In  making  a  fight  on  the  saloon,  it  should  be  re- 
membered that  mighty  few  people  are  interested  in 
mere  propaganda,  simply  because  it  is  based  upon 
cold-blooded  statistics  or  upon  hot-blooded  invec- 
tive. For  the  most  part,  we  are  dealing  with  plain, 
every-day  men,  who  are  decidedly  commonplace  in 
their  thinking,  but  who  are,  nevertheless,  responsive 
to  the  human  appeal. 

"Good  government"  and  "reform  measures"  al- 
most always  lack  human  contact.  They  are  super- 
imposed, and  the  common  man  doesn't  like  that  kind 
of  treatment.  The  corrupt  politician  knows  this, 
and  he  plays  the  game  accordingly. 

The  best  kind  of  reform  is  that  which  emerges 
from  among  the  people.  It  is  when  they  discover 
a  great  social  fact  for  themselves  that  they  become 
most  enthusiastic  about  it. 

The  human  side  of  the  saloon  business  simply 
must  be  reckoned  with  by  saloon  fighters.  One  way 
to  get  next  to  the  people  is  actually  to  get  next  to 
them — in  open  forum  discussions,  in  their  own  so- 
cial groups,  in  the  shops,  in  their  homes. 

It  may  be  slower  work  to  put  the  saloon  out  of 


How  to  Fight  the  Saloon       303 

business  through  a  process  of  education  based  upon 
human  facts  and  daily  fellowship,  but  in  the  long 
run  it  is  a  surer  and  a  more  permanent  way. 

There  are  still  some  anti-saloon  men  who  are  in- 
clined to  underestimate  the  influence  of  organised 
labour  in  the  fight  between  the  wets  and  drys. 

Aside  from  the  question  of  the  right  or  wrong 
of  trade  unionism  itself,  it  must  not  be  forgotten  that 
the  organised  labour  movement  is  a  tremendously 
powerful  machine,  and  that  it  is  the  only  organisa- 
tion which  speaks  officially  for  the  workingmen  of 
-this  country,  both  organised  and  unorganised.  For 
if  the  trade  union  doesn't  speak  for  the  workers, 
who  does?  No  other  organisation  dares  make  the 
claim  to  express  the  hopes  and  aspirations  and  wishes 
of  the  common  people. 

Think  for  a  moment  of  the  resources  of  the  labour 
movement  in  this  country.  It  is  probable  that  in 
all  the  branches  of  trade  unionism  there  is  a  total 
membership  of  nearly  3,000,000.  And  these  are  un- 
doubtedly the  choicest,  most  highly  skilled,  most 
intelligent  workingmen  in  America. 

There  are  literally  thousands  of  paid  officials  who 
give  their  entire  time  to  the  task  of  building  up 
this  movement.  Most  of  the  international  unions 
employ  men  of  very  superior  ability  to  direct  their 
national  policies,  and  to  meet  and  deal  with  the  best 
brain  power  that  their  employers  can  buy. 

Practically  every  international  union  prints  an  offi- 
cial monthly  "journal"- — there  are  over  100  inter- 


304  Why  Prohibition! 

national  labour  bodies — some  of  these  "journals" 
ranking  with  high  grade  magazines  in  typographical 
effect  and  subject  matter. 

Besides  these,  nearly  every  big  city  has  one  or 
more  weekly  labour  papers,  these  as  a  rule  being 
the  official  organs  of  local  central  labour  unions. 
There  are  something  like  250  labour  papers  pub- 
lished in  this  country,  which  have  an  enormous  cir- 
culation. John  Graham  Brooks  once  said  that  the 
average  trade  unionist  reads  his  labour  paper  as  the 
early  Christians  read  their  new  testament. 

The  international  labour  bodies  hold  annual  con- 
ventions, which  are  of  supreme  importance  to  all 
men  and  women  engaged  in  the  various  crafts, 
whether  they  are  members  of  the  union  or  not,  for 
these  conventions  determine  matters  which  are  bound 
to  influence  all  these  workers. 

Besides  the  international  craft  or  trade  unions, 
there  is  the  American  Federation  of  Labor,  com- 
posed of  delegates  from  each  of  the  international 
trade  unions  affiliated  with  it,  and  delegates  from 
state  labour  bodies  and  from  central  labour  bodies. 
This  constitutes  the  most  powerful  group  of  labour 
men  in  this  country. 

The  Federation,  with  its  various  departments, 
each  finely  organised  and  equipped,  is  a  splendid 
fighting  machine.  In  addition  to  its  paid  organisers, 
it  has  a  host  of  volunteer  workers  in  every  part  of 
the  country.  Many  of  the  international  unions  have 


How  to  Fight  the  Saloon       305 

great  office  buildings  of  their  own,  and  practically 
all  have  highly  organised  office  forces. 

Then  there  are  the  various  railroad  brotherhoods, 
which  are  not  affiliated  with  the  American  Federa- 
tion of  Labor.  The  building  trades  have  other 
unions  which  are  still  separated  from  the  American 
Federation  of  Labor.  As  already  noted,  these  com- 
bined trade  unions  are  nearly  3,000,000  strong. 

Reference  has  already  been  made  to  state  organi- 
sations. Practically  every  state  in  the  Union  is  or- 
ganised as  a  separate  unit.  Then  there  are  some- 
thing like  600  central  labour  bodies.  These  meet 
regularly  to  discuss  local  labour  matters. 

Here  is,  then,  a  compact  organised  body  of  work- 
ingmen,  which  deals  specifically  with  all  economic 
and  social  questions  which  concern  workingmen  and 
working  women.  Isn't  it  worth  while  for  the  anti- 
saloon  man  to  "get  next"  to  this  movement,  trying 
to  find  out  what  these  workers  are  driving  at?  It 
requires  a  sympathetic,  open-minded  approach,  how- 
ever— any  other  kind  of  a  spirit  is  sure  to  fail. 

And  if  one  can  get  a  grip  on  the  real  power  back 
of  the  labour  movement — its  immense  power  for 
good — and  then  try  unselfishly  to  direct  it  in  this 
fight  on  the  saloon,  which  is  its  own  greatest  enemy, 
the  saloon  question  will  be  settled. 

Remember,  too,  that  it  is  in  the  territory  in  which 
organised  labour  is  strongest — the  great  industrial 
areasi — that  the  saloon  fighters  will  have  their  stiffest 
struggle  during  the  next  few  years. 


306  Why  Prohibition! 

The  liquor  men  are  making  strenuous  efforts  to 
capture  the  labour  movement — why  leave  the  field 
to  them ;  especially  when  the  workingman  knows  that 
his  best  interests  lie  with  those  who  are  opposing 
the  liquor  business  ?! 

This  is  a  task  which  requires  the  best  that  the 
anti-saloon  movement  possesses — it  can't  be  done  in 
a  cheap,  hurried  fashion.  It  will  require  large  plans 
and  big  men  with  broad  minds. 

When  the  liquor  business  has  been  abolished,  you 
will  be  glad  to  recall  that  your  hand  helped  to  give 
it  its  solar  plexus  blow !  And  the  way  you  can  best 
do  it  is  to  use  the  right  kind  of  literature. 

One  of  the  fine  things  about  this  method  is  that 
anybody  can  use  it.  Some  can  get  better  and  more 
results  than  others,  but  all  can  get  some  results. 

There  are  several  important  advantages  in  using 
literature.  The  leaflet  you  give  a  man  always  sticks 
to  the  point.  We  don't  always  do  so.  Therefore, 
it  never  gets  side-tracked  by  a  specious  argument. 
It  never  loses  its  temper.  It  will  be  read  by  people 
who  are  sometimes  ashamed  to  talk  on  the  subject 
you  wish  to  present.  Frequently  it  will  tell  the  story 
far  better  than  you  can  put  it.  It  never  gets 
"rattled." 

You  should  be  familiar  with  the  arguments  or 
the  appeals  you  are  making  in  the  printed  page; 
first,  because  you  should  know  just  which  leaflet  is 
needed  for  a  particular  case;  and  second,  because 


How  to  Fight  the  Saloon       307 

you  should  know  just  what  to  use  next  in  order  to 
follow  up  your  previous  effort. 

It  is  helpful,  sometimes,  to  underscore  certain 
words  or  sentences.  This  for  two  reasons^ — it  will 
call  attention  to  the  most  important  parts  of  the 
leaflet,  and  it  catches  the  eye  of  the  casual  reader 
who  may  not  care  to  take  time  to  read  the  entire 
leaflet.  These  outstanding  "catch-words"  may  hold 
his  attention,  and  possibly  interest  him  to  the  extent 
that  he  may  want  to  study  the  entire  pamphlet. 

You  should  have  a  system  in  your  plan  in  order 
to  get  the  best  results.  Map  out  a  particular  dis- 
trict which  you  will  determine  to  cover,  and  then 
work  it.  This  may  be  done  in  various  ways.  A 
house  to  house  canvass  is  always  effective.  This 
method  also  affords  an  opportunity  of  becoming  ac- 
quainted with  those  whom  you  are  trying  to  reach. 

If  you  want  to  win  the  men  in  a  workingmen's 
community,  first  secure  their  names  and  addresses. 
One  of  the  best  ways  to  do  this  is  to  copy  the  names 
of  voters  from  election  sheets  posted  in  polling 
places.  Or  if  the  city  is  not  too  large,  you  may  se- 
cure their  names  and  addresses  from  the  city  direc- 
tory. Possibly  you  can  get  them  from  interested 
employers.  Then  mail  them  regularly  such  leaflets 
as  you  think  should  be  put  out. 

Plan  your  series  of  leaflets  so  that  they  will  have 
a  cumulative  value.  If  such  a  mailing  campaign  is 
continued  for  a  month,  sending  the  leaflets  weekly, 
so  that  they  will  be  received  each  Saturday  morning, 


308  Why  Prohibition! 

for  instance,  it  is  certain  to  make  an  impression. 
There  is  value  in  sending  them  at  stated  periods, 
rather  than  at  irregular  times.  It  is  the  steady 
rhythmic,  repeated  blow  in  the  same  place  that 
counts. 

The  same  general  method  may  be  adopted  for  the 
purpose  of  reaching  the  members  of  labour  unions, 
although  their  names  will  be  more  difficult  to  se- 
cure. However,  a  little  tact  may  get  them. 

Perhaps  you  can  get  a  trade-unionist  to  put  out 
the  leaflets  among  his  associates  at  the  regular  meet- 
ing of  his  union.  In  some  instances  literature  is  reg- 
ularly read  in  such  meetings  at  the  period  designated 
uthe  good  and  welfare  of  the  order." 

Enlist  in  your  cause  a  workingman  in  a  particular 
shop  who  will  regularly  distribute  the  printed  mat- 
ter. Literature  distributed  among  men  in  the  shop 
is  passed  from  man  to  man  and  is  usually  thoroughly 
discussed  at  the  noon  hour,  as  their  lunches  are  be- 
ing eaten. 

Leaflets  may  be  used  at  the  close  of  an  anti-liquor 
sermon,  or  after  a  temperance  meeting,  or  they  may 
be  used  as  advertising  matter  in  giving  publicity  to 
the  meeting.  Housekeepers  may  give  them  to  the 
men  who  call  at  their  back  doors  to  deliver  grocer- 
ies, meat,  milk,  ice,  etc.  Workingmen  who  are  tem- 
porarily employed  in  your  home  should  also  have 
your  interest. 

Occasionally  crisp,  up-to-date  leaflets,  especially 


How  to  Fight  the  Saloon       309 

those  dealing  with  the  economic  aspects  of  the  liquor 
problem,  will  be  printed  by  your  local  paper. 

Every  church  and  every  individual  interested  in 
closing  the  saloon  should  put  out  anti-liquor  litera- 
ture. In  some  instances  men  are  spending  fortunes 
for  the  sole  purpose  of  sending  broadcast  printed 
matter  that  tells  of  something  in  which  they  are  in- 
terested. Every  political  party  uses  it.  Reformers 
employ  it.  The  Socialists  regard  it  as  their  most 
valuable  propaganda  method.  General  advertisers 
send  out  tons  of  it.  They  do  it  because  they  have 
found  that  it  pays.  If  it  pays  them,  it  will  pay  in 
your  work  even  though  you  are  compelled  to  work 
on  a  more  limited  scale. 

Nobody  can  tell  what  a  single  leaflet  will  do  if  it 
reaches  the  right  person. 

The  great  reform  movements  in  history  have  been 
successful  because  of  the  enthusiasm  of  the  person- 
alities who  threw  themselves  into  these  movements. 

And  let  it  be  remembered  that  these  men  were 
rarely  counted  great  before  they  began  their  work — 
it  was  the  work  that  revealed  their  real  ability,  even 
to  themselves. 

What  is  needed  in  the  fight  against  the  liquor 
traffic  is  a  man  in  each  community  who  will  make 
himself  responsible  for  seeing  to  it  that  the  people 
get  the  facts — and  who  will  put  into  the  entire  task 
the  warmth  and  vigour  that  will  take  it  out  of  the 
realm  of  mere  routine  and  formality. 

A  real  man — only  one. 


310  Why  Prohibition! 

One  who  has  the  power  to  stir  others,  and  who 
will  say  to  them,  "Come  on — let's  do  it,"  but  who 
will  do  it  whether  anybody  comes  or  not. 

One  who  does  the  thing  which  everybody  else  said 
couldn't  be  done. 

One  who  is  ready  to  go  to  the  first  line  of  the 
trenches  because  he's  fired  with  the  stuff  that  makes 
martyrs  and  heroes — but  who  never  thinks  of  him- 
self as  a  hero  and  still  less  a  martyr. 

One  such  man  in  your  town  can  work  wonders- 
one  man! — just  one. 

Will  you  be  the  manfi 


FACSIMILES  OF  POSTERS  USED  IN 
STRENGTHEN  AMERICA  CAMPAIGN 


Using  the  Poster  to  point  the  truth 

Sometimes  truth  presented  in  a  simple,  graphic 
form  strikes  home  with  greater  force  than  a  care- 
fully worked  out  argument,  elaborated  by  statistics 
and  a  logical  array  of  facts. 

And  so,  to  those  who  are  engaged  in  popular  cam- 
paigns against  the  liquor  traffic,  the  posters  in  the 
following  pages  may  be  illuminating  and  suggestive. 

These  posters  were  used  in  the  Strengthen  Amer- 
ica Campaign,  conducted  by  the  Federal  Council  of 
the  Churches  of  Christ  in  America,  and  were  repro- 
duced in  many  newspapers  and  magazines. 

The  originals  were  22  by  28  inches,  and  were 
printed  in  two  colors.  They  made  friends  for  the 
campaign  because  they  are  free  from  bitterness  and 
malice — just  simple,  appealing  pictures  and  state- 
ments. 

If  desired,  these  posters  may  be  duplicated  by 
local  committees,  and  used  in  their  campaigns  and 
the  author  is  ready  to  make  suggestions  regarding 
their  most  effective  use,  if  those  interested  will  cor- 
respond with  him,  addressing  him  care  of  The  Fed- 
eral Council  of  the  Churches  of  Christ  in  America, 
105  East  22nd  Street,  New  York. 


LOSE  THE  SALOONS 


I  O  you  believe 
IF  that  the 
traffic  in  alcohol 
does  more  harm 
than 


Help  stop  it. 


Who  is  entitled 
to  Compensation? 


-Lost  by:: 
liquor  men 
because  Saloons 
were  closed. 


Spent  for  taxei 
because  saloons 
were  open  _ 


::          or       :: 

Mice  Department;? 
jail*,  alms-houses, 
insane  asylums, 
hospitals,  etc. 


Instead  of  the  state  compensating  liquor  men, 
liquor  men  should  compensate  the  state. 

"  If  you  believe  that  the  traffic  in  Alcohol  .. 
does  more  harm  than  good-  help  stop  it! 


"Personal  Liberty" 
—and  Your  Body 

You  CANT  do  as  you  please  in  a  democracy 

— not  even  with  the  things  that  are 

most  precious  to  you. 

SUPPOSE  YOU  TRY  TO  KILL  YOUR  BODY— TO  COMMIT 

SUICIDE. 

If  You  Succeed— Billy  Sunday  Says  You'll 
Go  to  Hell! 

If  You  Fail-the  Law  Says  You'll  Go  to  Jail! 

BUT  THE  STATE  HAS  A  RIGHT  TO  CALL  ON  YOU  TO  GO 
TO  WAR— TO  DEMAND  YOUR  BODY  FOR  SERVICE! 

If  You  Believe  That  the  Traffic  in 

Alcohol  Does  More  Harm  Than 

Good— HELP  STOP  IT! 


When  the  OTHER 
Man  DrinKs: 

It  lowers  YOUR  wages — 

because  boozers  decrease  average  wage  paid. 

It  increases  YOUR  taxes — 

because  the  state  cares  for  liquor's  wreckage. 

It  boosts  YOUR  grocery  bill— 

because  store-keepers  increase  prices  to  make  up 
unpaid  bills  of  drunkards. 

It  increases  YOUR  life  insurance  premiums — 

because  shortened  lives  of  boozers  raise  average 
expense  of  life  insurance. 

Isn't  it  YOUR  business  if 
OTHER  men  drink? 

If  You  Believe  That  the  Traffic  in 

Alcohol  Does  More  Harm  Than 

Good— HELP  STOP  IT! 


Dorit  Let  Her  Sign! 


*^z&- 


If  you  believe  that  the  traffic  in  Alcohol    „ 
does  more  harm  than  good  -  help  stop  it! 


"Food  Will  Win 

The  War" 

The  liquor  men  admit  that  they  use  one 
per  cent  of  the  grain. 

One  per  cent  of  the  grain  will  feed  one 
per  cent  of  the  people. 

THIS   MEANS   ONE  MILLION    PEOPLE— BECAUSE   THERE 
ARE  ONE  HUNDRED  MILLION  OF  US  IN 
THIS  COUNTRY. 

We  shall  probably  send  one  million  soldiers 

to  France. 

This  Means  That  the  Liquor  Men  Are  Wasting  Enough  Foodstuffs 
to  Feed  Every  Last  Man  Who  Will  Go  to  the  Trenches! 

If  You  Believe  That  the  Traffic  in 

Alcohol  Does  More  Harm  Than 

Good— HELP  STOP  IT! 


BOOZE  DRINKERS 

"Toss  or  a  $3800 

Workingman's  Home 

Every  Minute! 

This  Means   1440  Homes  Every  Day!    It 
Means  535,600  Homes  Every  Year! 

Counting   Five   Persons   to   a   Family,  it   Means   That   Nearly 

3,000,000  Persons  Could  Be  Comfortably  Housed  on  ther 

Amount    We    Waste    on    Drink    Every    Year. 

THINK   IT   OUT   IN  TERMS   OF   THE   NEEDS   OF   THIS 

TOWN.     WHAT  WOULD  THE  DRINK  BILL  OF  THIS 

CITY  DO  FOR  YOU  AND  YOUR  NEIGHBORS? 

If  You  Believe  That  the  Traffic  in  Alcohol 

Does  More  Harm  Than  Good— 

HELP  STOP  IT! 


The  Shadow  of  Danger 


If  you  believe  that  the  traffic  in  Alcohol 
does  more  harm  than  good-  help  stop  it!' 


UncleSam'sCensus 
Figures  Say— 

If  the  money  now  invested  in  the  liquor 

industry  were  invested  in  the  average 

American  industry — 

FOUR  TIMES  AS  MANY  WORKERS  WOULD  BE  EMPLOYED. 
FOUR  TIMES  AS  MUCH  WAGES  WOULD  BE  EARNED. 

FOUR  TIMES  AS   MUCH   RAW   MATERIAL   WOULD   BE 

REQUIRED. 

How  can  more  workers  employed,  more 

wages  earned,  and  more  raw  materials 

required,  create  a  labor  panic? 

If  You  Believe  That  the  Traffic  in 

Alcohol  Does  More  Harm  Than 

Good— HELP  STOP  IT! 


Death  Rates  per  thousand 
among  Workers 


Brewery 
Workers      to 

All 

Workers 


Average  death  rate  of  brewers  50% 
higher  than  average  for  all  workers 

"  If  you  believe  that  the  traffic  in  Alcohol 
does  more  harm  than  good  help  stop  it. r 


Charge  it  up  to  Booze! 

Child 
Divorces  Poverty  Insanity  Pauperism  Desertion    Crime 


And  The  Workingman  pays  most  of  the 
bills  for  taking  care  of  this  wreckage ! 

If  you  believe  that  the  traffic  in  Alcohol 
does  more  harm  than  good  -  help  stop  it! 


We  spend  in  one  year: 

for  intoxicating  liquor *  2,000,000,0 00 

for  bread  and  clothing $2,000,000,000 

Here's  what  labor  gets  out  of  each  Industry 

Red  -Bread  and  Clothing  Industries 
Black-  Liquor  Industry 

Wage  Earners  Employed 

Bread  and  Clothing  Industries  employ  8 
times  as  many  as  Liquor  Industry. 

Wages  Paid 

Bread  and  Clothing  Industries  pay5l/2 
times  as  much  as  Liquor  Industry. 

Raw  Materials  Required 

Bread  and  Clothing  Industries  use  5 
times  as  much  as  Liquor  Industry. 

If  you  believe  that  the  traffic  in  Alcohol 
does  more  harm  than  good-  help  stop  it! 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DUE  ON  THE  LAST  DATE 
STAMPED  BELOW 


AN  INITIAL  FINE  OF  25  CENTS 

WILL  BE  ASSESSED  FOR  FAILURE  TO  RETURN 
THIS  BOOK  ON  THE  DATE  DUE.  THE  PENALTY 
WILL  INCREASE  TO  SO  CENTS  ON  THE  FOURTH 
DAY  AND  TO  $1.OO  ON  THE  SEVENTH  DAY 
OVERDUE. 


REC'D  LD 


NOV211S58 


l5Mar54Vl 


7Jan'64DC 


REC'D  LD 


DEC?  6 '63 -12  M 


LD 


LD 


m 


Q   Q 


RECCIRC    MAY 


1994 


REC'D  LD 


MAY  1 6  1t 


REtlflFFITT 


U.C.BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CAUFORNIA  LIBRARY 


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